Thailand’s GDP for 2013 may be revised lower

BANGKOK, June 16 (TNA) - Thailand’s GDP for 2013, which was projected at 5 percent growth earlier, could be reduced due to several persisting negative factors, said Somchai Sujjapongse, director-general of Thailand’s Fiscal Policy Office. Negative factors, including high household debt and the government-sponsored rice pledging scheme at 15,000 baht per tonne weight, need to be monitored closely, he said. Mr. Somchai’s remarks were made after the IMF confirmed its positive outlook on the Thai economy and was confident the country’s GDP would meet the target growth of 5 percent in 2013, because of high private consumption and spending by the public sector. Touching on capital outflows, which saw the Thai stock market tumbled last week, Mr. Somchai said he believed the outflows would continue but on short-term basis if the United States continued its quantitative easing programme and Japan kept its monetary injection into its economic system. He said some investors had already switched to invest in Russia and Brazil due to higher yields, saying investors should be prepared for more capital inflows, which might depress the Thai baht again. (TNA)