The fall was larger in percentage terms than the 15.5 percent annual drop recorded in the previous month and conforms to the much-dreaded W-shaped recessionary pattern.

One factor in the faster rate of annual decline was that sales in the Asia-Pacific region fell compared with the previous month, to $8.57 billion, down from $8.69 billion. All the other reasons saw sales increases.

The annual fall in May was still considerably less than the 31.5 percent annual fall recorded in March 2009, indicating that a supply chain stall that took place in the first quarter of 2009 is now largely over but that fundamental demand for consumer goods is still low. It may even be falling in some regions as unemployment rises and the general public consumes less and saves more.

The SIA publishes WSTS numbers as a three-month average. It argues that this smoothes out the data which would otherwise display the effect of in-quarter reporting that tend to treat March, June, September and December as five-week months. However, it is still possible to compare actual sales year-on-year and avoid such problems.

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