Economist Trinh Nguyen recently posted a thread on Twitter hoping to show that there’s some hope for the recovery of SE Asia.
In the thread, the Philippines tied India and Thailand for the highest month-on-month growth (+14%) in consumer mobility, which Google defines as “arrivals at retail stores, groceries, transit stations, and workplaces”.
This data compared mobility data from January 2022 against data from December 2021.
Ms. Nguyen then compared each country’s current level of mobility against its pre-pandemic mobility level; in that graph, the Philippines is shown to have the fifth-highest mobility level, down just under 5% from pre-pandemic levels.
Thailand and India are both showing mobility levels well in excess of their pre-pandemic levels, with Indonesia showing a slight gain, and Singapore registering basically flat.
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The data was presented without much in the way of commentary, but to me it says that the ebb and flow of people within the Philippines is starting to more closely resemble what it was before this whole mess started in 2020.
Many of the businesses that we’ve covered in over the past two years rely on this activity for “normal” financial results.
Foot traffic is essential to businesses like Jollibee [JFC 252.00 0.40%], Philippine Seven Corp [SEVN 83.60], Robinsons Retail Holdings [RRHI 60.50 1.17%], Vistamalls [STR 3.80 2.70%], and the public’s willingness to move around the country is critical to airline and travel-adjacent companies like Cebu Pacific [CEB 47.90 4.13%], Philippine Airlines [PAL susp], MacroAsia [MAC 5.73 0.53%], and Megawide [MWIDE 5.49 5.37%].
While Ms. Nguyen’s graphs demonstrate reason for hope, they do have their limitations; namely, they don’t speak to the purchasing activity and purchasing intent of the individuals tracked, and mostly represent the degree to which people have been able to resume their normal physical movement patterns.
What they’re spending their money on, how much money they’re spending when they spend, and how often they’re spending are all things that would help give us a better image of where we are in this recovery.
Still, it’s good to know that as the movement restrictions lift, we should expect that people will pretty much resume moving around like they did before.
Now, exactly what they do while they’re moving around still needs to be ironed out!
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