October's export orders continued to creep up, but nothing more than that, and the DI has turned down, warning of downside risk from here. Admittedly, export orders have been tending to lag actual exports, but with the PMI weakening too, we've probably seen the best of the export cycle.

Today's October FDI data once again illustrate the big reorientation of Taiwan's investment and trade flows away from China and towards the US. For FDI that's been encouraged by Biden subsidies, but Trump doesn't like those, nor the big trade surplus that Taiwan now runs with the US.

The headlines don't show much change in the labour market in October, with the unemployment rate still comfortably below 3%. But while employment overall was stable, that was because of government jobs. Employment in the private sector fell again and is now the lowest since July 2023.

The post-2020 rise in wage growth is holding in manufacturing. In services, it is less obvious, but for the economy overall, the trend in wage growth is still comfortably above 2% YoY, whereas in the 15 years from 2003 it was closer to 1%. This rise, in turn, should raise the floor for inflation.

Including CGBs, the credit impulse is weak, but not terrible, and there's been a tick-up in bank lending and mortgages since August. However, there's nothing to suggest any real momentum in the credit cycle. At the same time, the deflationary move into time deposits continues.

Export growth in the first ten days of November fell to zero. And while the small number of days make this data set volatile, it comes after weakness in broader data for October, both full-month trade, and the PMI. The weakness in exports is a big deal for the BOK when domestic demand is also soft.

There might be some signs of better sentiment feeding into prices, but they aren't strong. Core sequential CPI inflation did get back to zero in October, but the 3mma remains negative. Despite the jump in PMI input prices last month, PPI also continues to fall.

Today's release from the BOJ of consumption activity through September is so-so, with a further moderation from the pick-up seen in June and July. As such, it isn't suggesting a repeat of the pick-up in household consumption that boosted Q2 GDP.

I thought the drop in the mfg PMIs in October might have been noise. But the November data show it is more than that, remaining weak in both Taiwan and Korea. Korea's exports today fell too. That makes the domestic cycle more important, and in Taiwan, that looks more resilient than Korea.