Macau’s imports of gold jewellery fell 64.1 percent year-on-year to 151 million patacas in July, the Statistics and Census Bureau (DSEC) said yesterday.
According to a statement by the bureau, gold jewellery imports dropped 64.6 percent year-on-year to 1.18 billion patacas in the first seven months of the year.
Imports of watches fell 52.6 percent to 265 million patacas in July. They declined 55.8 percent to 1.68 billion patacas between January and July.
Gold jewellery and watches are popular with visitors from the Chinese mainland. The number of mainland visitors tumbled by 97.4 percent year-on-year to 66,489 in July, the bureau announced last month.
Macau’s merchandise exports in the first seven months fell 17 percent to 6.18 billion patacas. Re-exports accounted for 86.2 percent of the total value of exports.
Merchandise imports decreased 24.7 percent to 36.89 billion patacas between January and July, resulting in a merchandise trade balance deficit of 30.71 billion patacas.
Food and beverages, which continued to be Macau’s number-one import segment, declined 27.4 percent to 5.68 billion patacas in the first seven months.
Two-third of Macau’s exports went to Hong Kong, while 35.5 percent of Macau’s imports originated from the mainland in the seven-month period.
