KUALA LUMPUR: The Malaysian economy is likely to remain on a steady path this year.
This is because the country’s macroeconomic fundamentals remain strong despite domestic and external challenges, says International Trade and Industry Minister Darell Leiking.
Asked on the outlook of the Malaysian economy in light of the consistent outflow of investments in the capital market, he said the outflow was being mitigated by direct investments coming into the country.
He was speaking to the media in a special briefing in conjunction with Pakatan Harapan’s first year anniversary as the Federal Government.
“While there is nothing that can be done to stop the fund outflow as that depends on the market sentiments, but what people do not see is the real investments that we are bringing in.
“We are almost a year old. But yet, many news were conflicting.
“Sometimes they were good and sometimes not so good, just like the news by Bloomberg, which were very specific.
“I would not discount what Bloomberg said, but I would like to know why Malaysia was the focus. Why is Malaysia their focus?
“If they want to improve us, that’s good. But, if they want to put other countries over us, then it’s not good.”
Darell was referring to a report published by Bloomberg on April 16 about foreign investors dumping Malaysian shares worth more than US$500 million (RM2.066 billion) this year.
Darell also highlighted that the electrical and electronics sector as well as chemical industries were expected to contribute to the potential investments worth RM6.6 billion from the United States.
He refuted allegations that investments in Malaysia were dwindling and investors were not coming to the country.
Instead, he said, many American companies had expressed interest in investing in Malaysia.
Darell did not name any of the American companies.
As for trade performance, he said Malaysia’s growth was expected to be about the same as it was in the previous year.
“Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) revised a little bit and expects that momentum to continue,” he said.
“I don’t see it (trade performance) going down badly because our fundamentals are still quite good.
“Our people are resilient and this government is going to react to the market when necessary.” Darell said Malaysia was seen as a digital free trade zone hub by many international companies.
“This is because they saw our land mass as being big, our security and our airports as well as storage,” he said.
On the palm oil trade, Darell played down the nation’s bleak prospects as he pointed out that such challenges were not new for Malaysia.
“It started with biodiesel if you remember. Now, it’s gone beyond biodiesel.
“You can see other countries are already working closely with us,” he added.
Darell said growth in total trade after the 14th General Election, from May to Nov last year, stood at seven per cent higher than the January to April 2017 period, which stood at 4.7 per cent.
A total of RM115.6 billion investments were approved for the period of July to December 2018.
As of March this year, Malaysian Investment Development Authority (Mida) has 399 manufacturing and services projects with investments totalling RM23.7 billion in the pipeline, including Sabah and Sarawak.