Most South Korean manufacturers expect their business conditions to worsen in the first quarter of 2024 due to sluggish domestic demand and high material costs, a poll showed Wednesday.
A survey of 2,156 manufacturing firms nationwide put the business sentiment index (BSI) at 83 for the January-March period, down 1 point from the current quarter, the Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KCCI) said.
It marks the third straight quarterly decline. A reading below 100 means companies expecting deteriorating business conditions outnumber those that anticipate an improving situation.
The fall comes amid weak domestic demand and rising raw material costs, which have weighed on local manufacturing companies.
The BSI for exporters stood at 93 for the coming quarter, up 10 points from three months earlier, while that for domestic demand-focused businesses shed 4 points to 80.
The figure for pharmaceutical makers came to 115, with that for cosmetics makers and shipbuilders reaching 113 and 100, respectively.
Most other sectors recorded a reading below 100, with the index amounting to 73 for steelmakers, 84 for IT firms and 87 for automakers.
The findings also showed that 63.5 percent of the respondents predicted they would not be able to achieve this year’s performance targets.
Nearly 54 percent of them cited flaccid domestic demand as the main reason, followed by high material costs at 19.1 percent and slumping exports at 18.1 percent.
Source: Yonhap News Agency