City’s imports of consumer goods continued to dwindle as of November

The city’s merchandise trade for the first eleven months this year was down by 2.6 percent year-on-year to MOP87.59 billion, dragged down by persistently dwindling imports of gold jewellery, fuels and watches, data released by Statistics and Census Service (DSEC) yesterday shows.
Macau’s total merchandise imports for November has dropped for a fourth consecutive month to MOP6.67 billion, down by 17.4 percent year-on-year, according to official data. In the month, the fall has been led by double-digit decrease in the imports of food and beverages, mobile phones and gold jewellery.
The merchandise export for November was up by 6 percent year-on-year to MOP868 million, boosted by soaring growth seen in the re-exports of electronic components.
For the first eleven months this year, the total value of merchandise imports fell by 3.9 percent to MOP77.81 billion, as imports of consumer goods including gold jewellery, watches, cars and handbags are all down by a double-digit percentage. At the same time, the city has also seen a 12.7 percent decline in the imports of fuels and lubricants (MOP6.43 billion) and 8.3 percent fall in the imports of construction materials (MOP2.91 billion) in the period.
Macau’s total value of exports for the first eleven months this year was MOP9.79 billion, up by 9.6 percent year-on-year. The growth was mainly supported by a rapid increase seen in the exports of clocks and watches as well as electronic components.
The merchandise trade deficit for the January to November period was MOP68.02 billion, according to DSEC.