{"id":5245,"date":"2025-04-22T01:31:24","date_gmt":"2025-04-22T01:31:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/himdasun.or.id\/?p=5245"},"modified":"2025-04-22T01:31:26","modified_gmt":"2025-04-22T01:31:26","slug":"macroscope-22-apr-2025-trade-review-march-trade-surplus-jumps-before-trump-tariffs-hit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/himdasun.or.id\/en\/2025\/04\/22\/macroscope-22-apr-2025-trade-review-march-trade-surplus-jumps-before-trump-tariffs-hit\/","title":{"rendered":"Macroscope (22-Apr-2025) – Trade Review: March Trade Surplus Jumps Before Trump Tariffs Hit"},"content":{"rendered":"

Trade Review: March Trade Surplus Jumps Before Trump Tariffs Hit<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Goods trade surplus surged in March.<\/strong> The goods trade surplus picked up sharply to USD4.3bn in Mar from USD3.1bn in Feb, against expectations of a narrowing (Mansek: USD2.6bn; Consensus: USD2.8bn) (Exhibits 1 and 2)<\/strong>. The surprise to our forecast was mainly due to stronger-than-expected commodity exports. Non-Oil&Gas surplus surged to USD6.0bn from USD4.8bn while Oil&Gas deficit was stable at USD1.7bn. The total goods trade surplus reached USD10.9bn in 1Q25 from USD9.1bn in 4Q24.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Commodity still led exports.<\/strong> Exports rose by 5.9% m-o-m, up from a 2.4% increase in Feb, led by higher iron and steel, oil&gas and machinery exports (Appendix)<\/strong>. Iron and steel exports surged by 19.6% m-o-m from -6.2% in Feb, led by higher volume (Exhibit 3)<\/strong>. Additionally, oil and gas exports rose by 28.8% from 6.7% in Feb. By contrast, coal and CPO exports declined by 5.5% and 3.6% m-o-m from -3.8% and 58.4% in Feb. Nonetheless, total export growth fell sharply to a stronger-than-expected 3.2% y-o-y from 13.9% in Feb, partly reflecting normalization from low-base effect in Feb.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Stronger exports to China and the US.<\/strong> By country, exports to China picked up sharply to 9.5% y-o-y from 5.3% in Feb, led by nickel products (Exhibit 4)<\/strong>. Exports to the US also surged to 20% y-o-y from 11.6% in Feb, in line with the surge in electrical equipment and footwear. Meanwhile, exports to the India deteriorated to -20.7% y-o-y from 8.1% in Feb, consistent with the sharp drop in terms of growth of CPO exports.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Steady imports.<\/strong> Imports moderated by 0.4% m-o-m, compared to a 5.1% increase in Feb, slightly below our forecast. Raw material import growth fell to 2.1% y-o-y from 4.7%, consistent with lower oil imports likely due to price effect (Exhibit 5)<\/strong>. By contrast, capital goods import growth picked up sharply to 27.4% y-o-y from 5.3%, consistent with the improvement in fiscal spending in March (see Fiscal Watch: Fiscal Spending and Tax Collections Improved in March<\/a>). In addition, consumption goods import growth improved to -5.8% y-o-y from -21.2%, likely reflecting the Ramadhan and Lebaran effect.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We continue to expect a widening CAD in 2025.<\/strong> We just recently revised down our 2025 CAD forecast to 1.5% of GDP from 1.1% initially (2025 BI forecast range: 0.5-1.3%), reflecting the impact of higher import tariff by the US announced on 2 April (see Tariff Ripple: Mapping the Impact on Indonesia<\/a>). Despite the better-than-expected trade surplus in Mar, we expect a lower trade surplus ahead due to both volume and price effects. In terms of monetary policy, we expect BI to pause again this week, keeping the policy rate at 5.75% amid persistent pressure to Rupiah and ongoing global uncertainties from Trump tariffs. However, we expect BI to continue sounding dovish by signaling that room for further cuts is still available.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mandiri Sekuritas Research<\/strong><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Trade Review: March Trade Surplus Jumps Before Trump Tariffs Hit Goods trade surplus surged in March. The goods trade surplus picked […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5245","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-market-research"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/himdasun.or.id\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5245","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/himdasun.or.id\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/himdasun.or.id\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/himdasun.or.id\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/himdasun.or.id\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5245"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/himdasun.or.id\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5245\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5246,"href":"https:\/\/himdasun.or.id\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5245\/revisions\/5246"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/himdasun.or.id\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5245"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/himdasun.or.id\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5245"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/himdasun.or.id\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5245"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}