PMI Monthly Report - May

Period : May 2019 – May 2021

Date : 19th May 2021

Researcher : Marsella Ismail

The Purchasing Managers Index (PMI) is the measure of the current direction of economic trends in manufacturing. A reading above 50 means expansion and below 50 means contraction while 50 is no change. The source of the monthly PMI for each areas are from IHS Markit Economics.

Monthly PMI of Euro Area, United Kingdom and United States

Euro Area, United Kingdom and the United States show positive trends in May with index still exceeding 60 since last month. All three areas recorded the all-time highest index with 63.1, 65.6 and 62.1 respectively. The increasing monthly PMI indicates that the manufacturing sector is doing well in terms of new orders, output, employment, suppliers’ delivery times and stock of items purchased.

Monthly PMI of Southeast Asia Countries

In Malaysia, the PMI fell from 53.9 to 51.3 while Thailand fell from 50.7 to 47.8 in the month of May. This is probably caused by the new wave of COVID-19 cases that hit both countries which affected the economy.

May shows an increase in the manufacturing PMI for Indonesia and Philippines. Indonesia keeps showing a positive increase since February 2021 while Philippines goes up despite the contraction last month due to the lockdown but is still below 50. Meanwhile for Singapore, the manufacturing PMI shows little to no changes.

Monthly PMI of China and Japan

For China, the manufacturing PMI shows a slight decrease since March with the latest index of 51.0 in May. Meanwhile, Japan has been consistently increasing since May last year but fell to 53.0 in May 2021 from 53.6 in April 2021.