South Korea‘s GDP increased by 4.1% YoY in Q4 2021. Thus, GDP unexpectedly continued to rise in the quarter. Analysts expected the increase to slow after GDP rose 4% in Q3. Quarter-on-quarter, GDP increased by 1.1% in Q4.
The manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ Index PMI is up in Japan to 54.6 in January. This is a slight increase compared to the previous month when the manufacturing PMI increased by 54.3. Service PMI, however, fell to 46.4.
In addition to the PMI data, there was also core CPI data from Japan. The Bank of Japan core CPI rose 0.9% last year compared to a 0.8 increase a year earlier. Thus, the core CPI unexpectedly continued to rise, as analysts expected a slowdown.
Singapore also released inflation data. CPI in December 2021 continued to rise by 4% YoY. In the previous month, the year-on-year increase was 3.8%. The Singapore central bank has therefore announced to tighten its monetary policy. Analysts expect a tightening to begin in April, as inflation is getting out of hand. However, this step is somewhat unexpected, as analysts did not expect a tightening to happen that soon.