Australia and New Zealand Banking Group Ltd. (ANZ) has lowered its forecasts of Taiwan’s GDP growth for 2015 and 2016.
ANZ has trimmed its estimate for Taiwan’s GDP growth for 2015 to 1.3% from an earlier forecast of 1.94% made in July. It has also significantly downgraded its prediction of Taiwan’s GDP growth for 2016 to 2.04% from 3.8%.
The less optimistic forecast of Taiwan’s 2015 GDP growth rate echoed a move by the government statistics office in mid-August. The government statistics office’s forecast now stands at 1.56%.
Meanwhile, some market analysts have even raised fears that Taiwan could be struggling to maintain GDP growth at 1% for this year, if external trade continues to contract.
In a research report, ANZ said that the global electronics industry is faced with downside risks as a result of weakening demand. As the high-tech sector is the backbone of Taiwan’s exports, the country has felt the pinch from the falling demand.