Briefs

 
Airports of Thailand opened a new terminal at U-tapao Airport yesterday to ease congestion at Don Mueang and Suvarnabhumi, Deutsche Presse-Agentur reported.
The new terminal at the Vietnam War-era airport, 173 kilometres east of Bangkok, will be able to handle 3 million passengers per year, according to AOT.
The opening aims to ease congestion at Bangkok’s Don Mueang International and Suvarnabhumi airports, which an internal audit found to be operating beyond their intended capacity, AOT said.
Don Mueang handled 21.5 million passengers in 2014, far exceeding its recommended capacity of 16.5 million. Suvarnabhumi, which has a recommended capacity of 45 million passengers, served 46.4 million in 2014.
U-tapao currently handles about 800,000 passengers per year, with most arriving on charter flights from Russia and China, AOT said.–DPA

SME CONFIDENCE
SLIPS IN Q2

The confidence of small and medium-sized enterprises in all regions of Thailand except the South continued to slide in the second quarter, according to a survey by TMB Bank.
The TMB-SME Sentiment Index fell from 42.1 points in the first quarter to 39.4 in the second. Scores below 50 indicate low confidence.
SMEs were concerned about the broad economic conditions, dragged down by low purchasing power as well as drought effects in the previous quarter, which hurt the income of farmers, who are the main buyers of SMEs’ products.
Confidence in the South bucked the trend thanks to increases in rubber, oil-palm and white-shrimp prices.
TMB Analytics expects economic conditions to slide further in the third quarter because of a slow recovery in purchasing power. While there have been improvements in agricultural prices, they remain limited, while output has not yet returned to normal.
 Boosting the economy would remain dependent on government and tourist spending.
Political factors are not high among SMEs’ concerns, given several external factors.

MOST ASIAN MARKETS
RISE ON CHINA DATA

Asian stock markets mostly rose yesterday as fresh Chinese data provided signs of improving conditions for the world’s second-largest economy.
China’s producer prices fell in July at their slowest rate in nearly two years, fuelling hopes that the end of a painful slowdown could be in sight for the Asian powerhouse, which is a key driver of the global economy.
Shanghai advanced 0.7 per cent after the Producer Price Index, which measures the cost of goods at the factory gate, fell 1.7 per cent year on year in |uly.
Sydney added 0.3 per cent by the close and Seoul ended 0.6 per cent higher. Hong Kong closed down 0.1 per cent.
Tokyo closed up 0.7 per cent on a weaker yen and as energy stocks got a lift.
Meanwhile, the SET Index continued rising, by 5.95 points to close at 1,548.21 yesterday with trade value of Bt69.83 billion. Foreign investors recorded net buys of Bt5.29 billion.