This article first appeared in The Edge Malaysia Weekly on September 11, 2023 - September 17, 2023

The Pulai parliamentary and Simpang Jeram state by-elections will be held on Saturday, Sept 9. The Pulai seat will be a three-cornered fight between Pakatan Harapan candidate Suhaizan Kaiat, Perikatan Nasional’s Zulkifli Jaafar and independent candidate Samsudin Mohamad Fauzi.

In Simpang Jeram, the candidates are Perikatan Nasional’s Dr Mazri Yahya, Pakatan Harapan’s Nazri Abdul Rahman and independent S Jeganathan. The by-elections are being held following the death of the incumbent for both seats, Datuk Seri Salahuddin Ayub, who was also the minister of domestic trade and cost of living.

The 12th Malaysia Plan is scheduled to be tabled when the Dewan Rakyat reconvenes on Monday. A total of six days have been set aside for this sitting, including three days of debates from Tuesday to Thursday and a winding-up session on Sept 18 and 19. 

Meanwhile, the Department of Statistics Malaysia (DoSM) is scheduled to release a slew of data this week. On Monday, the Industrial Production Index (IPI) for July will be out. After recording a 2.2% year-on-year decline in June, economists remain cautious of the performance for July and do not rule out that it may be weaker than anticipated.

On the same day, DoSM will release the Monthly Manufacturing Statistics for July. The sales value of the manufacturing sector declined 4% y-o-y to RM147.7 billion in June after growing 3.3% in the previous month. The food, beverage and tobacco subsector posted three consecutive months of double-digit declines. The Wholesale & Retail Trade numbers will also be out on Monday.

On Friday, DoSM will release the Domestic Tourism Survey for 2022. The hospitality sector continues to rely on the domestic tourism market pending the recovery of foreign arrivals to pre-pandemic levels. In 2021, a total of 66 million domestic visitors spent a total of RM18.4 billion.

The Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation (Mosti) plans to hold a meeting this week with the secretaries-general of the education, higher education and human resources ministries to establish a Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) Committee. This comes after a significant drop in the number of upper secondary students choosing the STEM stream which is worrying as Malaysia aims to become a developed nation by 2030.

On Tuesday, the Court of Appeal will decide on the status of the prosecution’s appeal against the acquittal of Datuk Seri Najib Razak and former 1Malaysia Development Bhd president and CEO Arul Kanda Kandasamy on abuse of power charges pertaining to the 1MDB audit report.

Najib was charged with abuse of power as a public officer in his capacity as the then prime minister and finance minister in altering the 1MDB audit report prepared by the National Audit Department. Najib and Arul Kanda were acquitted in March after the High Court decided that there was no prima facie case.

On the corporate front, companies that will hold their annual general meeting include LTKM Bhd, Global Oriental Bhd and Karyon Industries Bhd on Tuesday; George Kent (Malaysia) Bhd on Wednesday; and Asia Media Group Bhd and Bintai Kinden Corp Bhd on Friday.

Across the Causeway, the inauguration of Singapore’s 9th president, Tharman Shanmugaratnam, will be held on Thursday. And from Sept 15 to Sept 17, Singapore will host the F1 Night Race. However, fewer spectators are anticipated due to the closure of the Bay Grandstand.

Elsewhere in Asia, on Sept 9, China will release its August Consumer Price Index and August Producer Price Index numbers. UOB Global Economics and Markets Research, in its weekly outlook (Sept 11 to Sept 15) citing Bloomberg, says the CPI will grow to 0.1% y-o-y from a contraction of 0.3% in July while PPI will contract 2.9% y-o-y from -4.4%.

On Tuesday, India will release its CPI for August, which is estimated to come in at 7.1% y-o-y from 7.44% the month before. UOB estimates its July industrial production, which will be released on the same day, to come in at 5.3% y-o-y from 3.7% in June.

The G20 Leaders’ Summit will be held in Delhi, India on Sept 9 and 10. The summit will be attended by the US, the UK, Canada, France, Japan, Russia and China.

The European Central Bank is due to make a monetary policy decision on Wednesday. Based on a Sept 8 Bloomberg poll, two analysts project a 25-basis-point (bps) hike to the ECB’s main refinancing rate while two others expect no change at 4.25%. UOB says it holds an “open mind as to what the decision will be in September and in subsequent meetings, though for now, we are keeping to our view of a pause in the current tightening cycle”.

Over in the US, the United Auto Workers union master agreement is set to expire. A new agreement is negotiated on behalf of nearly 150,000 members working with three major US carmakers. This expiry could set the stage for a possible strike, shutting down an important section of the US economy. Research firm Anderson Economic Consulting estimates that a 10-day strike could cost the US economy over US$5 billion (RM23 billion). A six-week strike in 2019 put the state of Michigan into a recession.

The US will release its August CPI numbers this week, with UOB estimating an increase of 3.5% y-o-y and 0.2% month on month after a 3.2% y-o-y growth in July. Core inflation is expected to come in at 4.2% y-o-y and 0.2% m-o-m, compared with 4.7% y-o-y in July, the research house adds.

The US will also be releasing its August PPI final demand on Thursday, which is expected to come in at 0.4% m-o-m and 1.5% y-o-y, from 0.3% m-o-m and 0.8% y-o-y in July.

Meanwhile, Friday is “triple witching” day — considered to be a significant stock market event. It is a day on which stock index futures, stock index options and stock options expire simultaneously. Equity trading volume tends to rise on these days and could cause trading to soar in the last hour as traders adjust their portfolios and could cause unusual price movements.

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