KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia will be able to withstand the short-term impact of the United States government shut down.
Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of Invest Malaysia 2018, Malayan Banking Bhd group head of global banking Datuk Muzaffar Hisham said Malaysia's fundamentals would be strong enough to hold on.
“This is not the first US government shutdown. We have seen it during President Barack Obama administration, and we have seen the worst shut down during President Bill Clinton administration and we now seeing it happening in the President Donald Trump administration,” he said.
“The shutdown is now in its third day, and though we believe that there impact on global markets, we at Maybank are not too overly worried. Fundamentally, Malaysia will be able to withstand.”
As of time of print, the US government had ended its three-day shutdown after Democrats agreed to end the standoff in exchange for Trump's Republicans promise of a debate on the future of young illegal immigrants, known as “the Dreamers.”
On the government's decision to not peg the ringgit to the US dollar, Muzaffar said the ringgit pegging in 1998 was dependent on the situation and economy at the time.
“Since we are in an open economy, there has been a bit of a hit on our economy. But you have seen over the last three quarters, the ringgit is strengthening and confidence level has improved,” he added.