Taiwan Institute of Economic Research (TIER) announced on Thursday that its latest economic forecast for growth is 3.29%, an increase of 0.14% from its January prediction. Experts suggest that Taiwan's economy is experiencing a balanced growth pattern internally and externally.
Business Development and Research Center Director Sun Ming-te (孫明德) attributes the positive outlook to strong demand for emerging technologies, such as AI, leading to inventory replenishment in certain industry chains. Global commodity demand rebounds and indicators like first-quarter imports, manufacturing output, and export orders show significant improvements. However, the attitude of corporate capital expenditures remains cautious, and the growth performance of private investment is not as strong as expected.
TIER expects prices to rise by 2.13% in 2024, higher than their previous prediction of 0.18%. Sun points out that prices for services are staying high, and expenses for eating out, renting, and electricity have been going up. He says that ongoing tensions in the Middle East might make it more expensive to ship things around the world and could affect the prices of important goods, making it hard to predict how inflation will change.
