Hiring outlook in S'pore weakens for a third quarter as sentiment dips

Hiring optimism in Singapore declined for the coming third quarter of the year, marking a dip in sentiment for three consecutive quarters.

- Tay Hong Yi

The latest fall is driven by finance and real estate employers turning more cautious amid subdued growth and cost challenges.

The net employment outlook for the finance and real estate sector fell by 30 percentage points to 15 per cent, according to results from the latest quarterly employment outlook survey conducted by recruitment firm ManpowerGroup and released on June 11.

The metric is a measure of hiring optimism, defined as the percentage of companies surveyed that intend to take on new staff, minus the percentage that intend to downsize.

However, the transport, logistics and automotive sector’s robust net outlook of 47 per cent, the highest of the nine sectors studied, cushioned the drop.

The figure is up 27 percentage points from the quarter before and 25 percentage points year on year, and is the second-highest figure for the sector in the 42 markets ManpowerGroup surveyed.

Only Ireland posted a stronger net outlook for the sector, at 50 per cent, in the latest poll, which was conducted in April.