Cost-of-Living support package to boost retail sales

For 2023, UOB expects retail sales to grow by 3.5%

Experts remain positive on the outlook of the retail market, citing many upside risks, including Singapore’s $1.1b Cost-of-Living Support Package.

“The additional cash disbursement of up to $200 in Dec 2023 for eligible Singaporeans under the Assurance Package (AP) and an extra $200 of CDC vouchers for each Singaporean household could provide incremental support to retail sales, on top of the handouts already announced in Budget 2023,” Jester Koh, UOB associate economist, said.

The additional relief from the government brought the AP to over $10b.

Apart from the relief package, Koh believes “consumers may front-load some of their spendings, particularly on big-ticket items like furniture, household equipment, watches and jewellery ahead of the second tranche of GST increase from the current 8% to 9% on 1 Jan 2024,” which, in turn, will boost retail sales.

“We continue to expect retailers to enjoy some level of domestic and external support,” Koh said.

Other factors that can boost retail sales include major events such as various sports, popular concerts and BTMICE (Business Travel and Meetings, Incentive Travel, Conventions and Exhibitions) activities and rising employment and resilient wage growth.

Koh, however, warned of downside risks to retail sales which include a weakening external environment, greater-than-anticipated easing in domestic/regional labour market conditions, and a slower-than-expected recovery of inbound Chinese tourists.

Follow the link for more news on

UOB

Singapore retail sales

Reaching the people who run Asia's businesses is harder than it used to be.

Inboxes are crowded. Attention is short. The executives you most want to reach — the founders, CFOs, and operators who actually move budgets — are the hardest to find through the usual channels. If you're building a company, a category, or a reputation, you already know this.

We've spent twenty years building the room they read. Singapore Business Review is where senior decision makers in Singapore and across Southeast Asia come for business coverage they can't get elsewhere — in print, online, and in person at the summits and roundtables we host across seven markets.

If you have something these readers should know about — a point of view worth publishing, a product worth their attention, an event worth their time — we'd like to hear what you're trying to do.

Book a meeting

| Or download the media kit (PDF)

240,000 senior readers quarterly in print Top 1,700 Singapore companies reached

7 markets across Southeast Asia