JAKARTA: Indonesia booked a $3.45 billion merchandise trade surplus in January, bigger than expected, amid surprisingly weak imports, official data showed on Monday.
A Reuters poll of analysts had expected a surplus of $1.91 billion for January.
The country had a $2.24 billion surplus in December.
The trade data is among a series of economic indicators the central bank will consider at its monthly policy review this week.
Bank Indonesia (BI) has cut interest rates twice since September and Governor Perry Warjiyo has said the bank has room to cut further, though most analysts polled by Reuters expect BI to keep interest rates unchanged on Wednesday.
Southeast Asia’s largest economy imported $18 billion worth of goods in January, down 2.67% from the same month a year earlier, in contrast with analysts’ forecast for growth of 9.95%.
That marked the first contraction in imports in eight months.
Imports of consumer goods and raw materials for industry contracted 7.16% and 3.15%, respectively.
Statistics Indonesia chief Amalia Adininggar Widyasanti said the drop was likely due to industry activities affected by Chinese New Year holidays, compared with holidays in 2024 which fell in February.
Exports rose 4.68% on an annual basis in January to $21.45 billion, compared with 6.99% growth expected in the poll.
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While shipments of its top commodities like coal, palm oil and nickel metals declined in value on a yearly basis, overall growth was supported by exports of ships, jewellery and chemical products.
Miner Freeport Indonesia also stopped exporting copper concentrate this year after its permit expired at the end of 2024.
Josua Pardede, economist with PermataBank, said the import contraction was unexpected, but likely to be temporary due to seasonal factors, predicting imports to rise later in the year and the current account deficit to widen.
“The widening of current account deficit will limit the room for BI’s rate cuts,” Pardede said, highlighting export challenges due to rising global trade tensions.
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