Below is a list of our Emerging Asia Publications for the last 5 months. If you are looking for reports older than 5 months please email info@pantheonmacro.com, or contact your account rep
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- BNM held rates at 2.75%, as expected, but its statement carried an unusually cautious tone.
- Singapore’s January retail sales were weaker than expected, but highly distorted by Lunar New Year.
- We raise our 2026 CPI call for the Philippines and cut that on Thailand; the difference is fuel policy.
Rising domestic and external demand lifting most boats in ASEAN
- We see no need yet to rethink our India CPI and rate calls, as fuel prices are already unnaturally high…
- …The clearer threat to CPI this year is the slowdown in agri growth; we see February inflation at 3.2%.
- The pre-Iran-war oil-price gains had barely any impact on industry in India and ASEAN.
- In one line: An understandable, and likely temporary, breather to start 2026.
- Indonesian exports fell well short of expectations in January, with the commodities lift still subdued…
- …But this should change in H2, with prices set to lift growth above 10%, helping to rebuild the surplus.
- The breach of BI’s CPI target range in February is skin-deep, but we’ve upped our 2026 call to 2.7%.
No post-Ukraine-war like burst, yet, to expect from export growth
Underlying price pressures rising, but feel free to ignore the breach of BI’s range
- In one line: New series paints a more stable picture of recent years; ’statistical discrepancies’ no longer a bug-bear.
- In one line: Household momentum is rebuilding, but still nowhere near as fast as this absurd headline suggests.
Ignore the y/y misses; lots to be reassured about in the Philippine trade details
THAI BALLOT AND HOT Q4 GDP NO SILVER BULLET
- …INDIA’S 2026/27 BUDGET KICKS THE CAN DOWN THE ROAD
- GDP growth in India cooled modestly to 7.8% in Q4, from 8.4% in Q3, based on the revamped series…
- …‘Statistical discrepancies’ are now much less of a headache; we’ve raised our 2026 forecast to 6.7%.
- The Supreme Court’s tariff ruling is a clear win for EM Asia; risks to export growth, in all, are receding.
- In one line: Members say “why wait” via a surprise cut.
- The BoT surprised almost all forecasters, including us, with an extra 25bp cut to its policy rate to 1.00%.
- At the same time, though, it has conceded the battle against structurally subdued GDP growth…
- …We still believe that 1.00% will mark the terminal rate, but more CPI misses could force another cut.
- Malaysian exports continue to defy expectations, soaring by 19.6% in January, due to the AI boom…
- …CPI inflation remains elevated, but only because of a sewerage cost increase that affected housing.
- Singaporean core inflation showed a surprise seasonally adjusted month-to-month decline.
- Booming Korean exports in the first 20 days of February are mainly a semiconductor story…
- …Chip exports skyrocketed almost 180% thanks to rising prices and volumes.
- The BoK is likely to hold rates on Friday, despite soft activity outside the tech sector.
An undoubtedly hot start to the year for two-way trade in Thailand
- Taiwan’s trade deal with the US has led to some strange upgrades to 2026 GDP among analysts...
- …We think the trade deal will make little difference; key AI exports were never constrained.
- Traditional industries would be unable to cushion the blow if AI demand were to suffer a pull-back.
- We think GDP rose by around 3½% in Q4, with consumers’ spending up about 2½%.
- AI-linked capex probably continued to surge, while net trade and inventories also made solid contributions.
- The recent pace of growth, however, looks unsustainable; we expect a slowdown in 2026.
- In one line: Blame another random spike in gold imports; purchases from Russia are tanking.
- GDP growth in Thailand leapt unexpectedly in Q4, to 2.5% from the post-pandemic low of 1.2% in Q3…
- …But this was largely due to a resumption of normal government business, as well as its mini-stimulus.
- We still see a broad slowdown this year, but have raised our 2026 forecast to 2.2% from 1.8%.
