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🔜 Merchant Yield. https://t.co/XcemXjNcRJ— Utrust (@UTRUST) October 6, 2022 

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 🇰🇷 Korean Exports for September 2.8% YoY (vs 3.3% expected)

Sector picture is clear: Electronics are old news, vehicles/parts doing well https://t.co/m3gl2bHRDa pic.twitter.com/mqX9axLXe3— Macrodesiac (@macrodesiac_) October 2, 2022 

Meanwhile, imports fell -2.4% in December, for the first time since November 2020. Energy imports continued to rise due to high prices but imports of other commodities and intermediate goods declined. Since about 40% of imports are for re-export, sluggish Korean imports indicate that global demand must have softened. 

"Information and entertainment unite the world. Millions of hours of quality video content is created every year, yet the current process for licensing and distribution is so archaic that much of it is left collecting dust in storage rooms."

Backlogs of work fell for the second consecutive month and the fastest pace in almost two-and-a-half years. Anecdotal evidence suggested that the current lack of demand enabled firms to focus on working through outstanding orders.

The December PMI data provided further evidence that South Korean manufacturing firms have continued to struggle in the face of the current global economic downturn.

Low levels of client demand, on both a domestic and international scale, were central to the latest deterioration and contributed to the sharpest contractions in new orders and new export orders in two-and-a-half-years.

Firms subsequently cut back on levels of production, input buying and employment. As indicated by the weakest degree of business confidence since September 2020, it looks as though firms are increasingly anticipating the current tough economic conditions to extend into the future.

"Adding to the gloominess of December's survey was a marked deterioration in vendor performance. The nationwide cargo trucker walkout in December saw an estimated 25,000 members strike for just over two weeks and as expected, caused major disruptions to supply chains across South Korea's manufacturing sector.

It will now be interesting to see how quickly delivery times are able to recover given that November saw overall vendor performance deteriorate to the smallest extent since pre-pandemic times.

"The only encouraging aspect of the latest survey data was the easing in inflationary pressures. Notably, firms raised their selling prices at the softest rate in the current 27-month sequence of inflation and average cost burdens increased at the joint-slowest pace in two years."

“If I can see that the Burger King down the street is offering $22 an hour, and I’m making $20 an hour at the Dunkin’ Donuts that I work at, then I know very clearly what my opportunity cost is,”

“Employers are reacting to that and saying, ‘Well, we’re going to increase wages internally because we don’t want to lose the staff that we’ve already trained.”