Singapore’s retail sales in January 2016 rose 7.5 percent from a year earlier, driven by higher sales of motor vehicles, the Department of Statistics said on Tuesday. Excluding motor vehicles, retail sales rose 1.4 percent. Compared with the previous month, retail sales dropped 1.2 percent in January.
The total retail sales value in January was estimated at USD4.1 billion, higher than the USD3.8b in January 2015.
Excluding car sales, medical goods & toiletries category posted the highest growth with 16.3 percent increase in January from the previous year, followed by the11.9 percent increase in department stores’ sales. Supermarkets, mini-marts & conveniences stores, wearing apparel & footwear and optical goods & books also registered growth.
However telecommunications apparatus & computers logged the biggest decline in January among all categories with a 30.5 percent drop in sales, followed by watches & jewellery’s 8.4 percent decrease.