April export growth slowed to 4.3% year-on-year from 18.9% YoY, while import growth edged down slightly to 6.6% YoY from 7.1% YoY in March. Through the first four months of the year, exports have grown 14.6% YoY and imports have grown 7.5% YoY.
Weaker-than-expected exports and broadly in-line imports translated to a smaller-than-expected trade surplus of USD 6.5bn in April. After a very strong contribution from net exports to first quarter GDP growth, April’s trade data release suggests that this boost will be smaller starting from the second quarter onwards.
By category, export strength was almost entirely concentrated in one category, the information, communication, and audio-video product exports, which includes semiconductors. This category grew by 114.6% YoY in April, bringing the year-to-date growth to 121.6% YoY. In April, this category accounted for 31.3% of total exports. However, the majority of other categories mostly saw negative growth in April, with many seeing double-digit year-on-year declines; the steepest declines included optical and precision instruments (-33.3%), mineral products (-27.9%), and electronic product parts (-17.7%).
