Current Economic Situation, June 2022

 

Services and Construction investment Up, Manufacturing, Retail Sales, Facilities Investment Down

 

Services and construction investment rose in April while manufacturing, retail sales, and facilities investment declined. Employment continued to increase in May and consumer prices rose at a faster pace.

 

Industrial production decreased by 0.7 percent from the previous month in April as manufacturing (down 3.3%, m-o-m and up 3.3%, y-o-y) declined while services (up 1.4%, m-o-m and up 5.1%, y-o-y) went up.

 

Construction investment (up 1.4%, m-o-m and down 1.1%, y-o-y) increased while retail sales (down 0.2%, m-o-m and up 0.5%, y-o-y) and facilities investment (down 7.5%, m-o-m and down 11.9%, y-o-y) decreased in April.

 

Exports rose by 21.3 percent year-on-year in May due to strong exports of semiconductors and petroleum products. Average daily exports increased by 10.7 percent from a year ago to US $2.67 billion in May 2022 from US $2.42 billion in May 2021.

 

The consumer sentiment index (CSI) declined by 1.2 points in May to 102.6 from the previous month. The business survey index (BSI) for the manufacturing sector also went down by 1 point to 86, and the BSI outlook for June 2022 decreased by 1 point to 87.

 

The cyclical indicator of the coincident composite index and the cyclical indicator of the leading composite index for April dropped by 0.3 points and 0.3 points, respectively.

 

The economy added 935,000 jobs year-on-year in May and the unemployment rate fell by 1.0 percentage point from a year ago to 3.0 percent.

 

The consumer prices grew by 5.4 percent year-on-year in May due to increases in individual service prices and the core inflation rose by 4.1 percent.

 

Stock prices dropped in May out of concerns for tight monetary policies caused by global inflationary pressure while the won became stronger due to the gradual easing of China’s lockdown measures and Korea treasury yields picked up.

 

Housing price growth eased in May (0.06% → 0.01%, m-o-m), and prices of Jeonse (lump-sum deposits with no monthly payments) held steady (0.01% → 0.00%, m-o-m).

 

While the economy has continued to see employment growth and gradual increases in domestic demand, concerns remain that continued inflation caused by external factors could undermine investment and restrict export recovery.  

 

Internationally, amid continued inflationary pressure caused by the prolonged Russia-Ukraine war, major economies making a swift transition of monetary policies including the US Fed’s big rate hike and continued supply chain disruptions have increased financial market volatility and economic downside risks across the world.   

 

The government will make its utmost efforts to stabilize prices and people’s livelihood and manage macroeconomic risks and stability by shifting into an emergency state to respond to economic challenges and rapidly taking actions according to the new government’s policy directions.

 

Key Statistics

Employment

	2020	2021										2022
	Annual	Annual	May	Jun	Jul	Aug	Sep	Oct	Nov	Dec	Jan		Feb	Mar	Apr	May
Number of employed (million)	26.90	27.27	27.55	27.64	27.65	27.60	27.68	27.74	27.80	27.30	26.95		27.40	27.75	28.08	28.49
Employment rate (%)	60.1	60.5	61.2	61.3	61.3	61.2	61.3	61.4	61.5	60.4	59.6		60.6	61.4	62.1	63.0
(Seasonally adjusted)	60.1	60.5	60.6	60.6	60.7	60.7	60.9	60.9	60.9	61.0	61.2		62.1	61.8	62.1	62.4

Consumer Price Index

                                                                                         (%)

 

Mining, Manufacturing, Electricity and Gas Production

                (Percentage change from the previous period, %)

1. Preliminary

2. Mining, Manufacturing, Electricity and Gas Production

3. End-point (month, quarter, and year)

4. Average operation ratio for the month (or quarter)

  

Service Output

           (Percentage change from the previous period, %)

      1. Preliminary

Retail Sales

(Percentage change from the previous period, %)

	2019	2020					2021					2022
	Annual	Annual	Q1	Q2	Q3	Q4	Annual	Q1	Q2	Q3	Q4	Q1¹	Mar¹	Apr¹
Retail sales	2.4	-0.2	-5.9	5.3	-0.4	1.1	5.9	1.7	2.2	0.8	1.1	-1.1	-0.7	-0.2
y-o-y	-	-	-2.8	1.8	1.5	-1.0	-	6.7	5.0	5.6	6.4	2.8	2.1	0.5

1. Preliminary

 

Facility Investment Index

     (Percentage change from the previous period, %)

	2020					2021					2022
	Annual	Q1	Q2	Q3	Q4	Annual	Q1	Q2	Q3	Q4¹	Q1	Feb	Mar¹	Apr¹
Facility investment index	5.9	-2.0	2.5	2.9	1.4	9.6	6.0	0.7	-0.8	-0.2	0.2	-5.6	-2.2	-7.5
y-o-y	-	7.9	5.7	7.7	3.0	-	12.4	13.2	6.2	6.2	-1.3	2.4	-5.3	-11.9

1. Preliminary

 

Construction Completed

 (Percentage change from the previous period, %)

	2020					2021					2022
	Annual	Q1	Q2	Q3	Q4	Annual	Q1	Q2	Q3	Q4¹	Q1	Feb	Mar¹	Apr¹
Construction Completed (Constant)	-2.1	1.7	-2.3	-2.5	1.3	-6.7	-5.2	-1.9	-1.1	4.1	-2.0	-7.2	1.2	1.4
y-o-y	-	1.2	-3.6	-2.2	-3.2	-	-9.0	-7.2	-8.1	-2.9	-1.6	-4.0	-5.2	-1.1

1. Preliminary

Exports and Imports

 (US$ billion, y-o-y, %)

	2018	2019	2020	2021						2022
	Annual	Annual	Annual	Annual	Q1	Q2		Q3	Q4	Q1	Apr	May
							May
Exports	604.86	542.23	512.50	644.40	146.40	156.73	50.73	164.54	176.73	173.24	57.83	61.52
(y-o-y, %)	5.4	-10.4	-5.5	25.7	12.5	42.0	45.5	26.5	24.5	18.3	12.9	21.3
Average daily exports	2.24	1.99	1.88	2.36	2.22	2.27	2.42	2.40	2.54	2.67	2.46	2.67
Imports	535.20	503.34	467.63	615.09	136.60	149.23	47.91	156.89	172.37	176.87	60.34	63.22
(y-o-y, %)	11.9	-6.0	-7.1	31.5	12.4	37.7	38.2	37.5	39.4	29.5	18.6	32.0
Average daily imports	1.98	1.85	1.71	2.25	2.07	2.16	2.28	2.29	2.48	2.72	2.57	2.75

 

Composite Indices of Coincident and Leading Indicators

                                                                                           (Points)

	2021				2022
	Sep	Oct	Nov	Dec	Jan	Feb	Mar¹	Apr¹
Cyclical indicator of coincident composite index	100.8	100.9	101.1	101.8	102.4	102.6	102.4	102.1
m-o-m (points)	-0.1	0.1	0.2	0.7	0.6	0.2	-0.2	-0.3
Cyclical indicator of leading composite index	101.1	100.7	100.4	100.2	100.1	99.8	99.6	99.3
m-o-m (points)	-0.3	-0.4	-0.3	-0.2	-0.1	-0.3	-0.2	-0.3

1. Preliminary

Please refer to the attached pdf.