Singapore's non-oil domestic exports (NODX) in December rose 9.4% year on year, following on from the strong 11.5% expansion in November. 
Analysts polled by both Reuters and Bloomberg had expected shipments to rise 5.8% from a year earlier. 
On a 3-month moving average, year on year basis, December NODX posted the first positive change (+2.3%), following declines for most of 2016, International Enterprise (IE) Singapore noted in its report on Tuesday. 
On a month-on-month and seasonally adjusted basis, NODX increased by 1% in December 2016, following November's 13% growth. Shipments reached S$14.0 billion in December, higher than the S$13.9 billion in November. 
NODX to the majority of Singapore's top 10 markets rose in December, except for the US, Japan, the European Union and Malaysia. The largest contributors to the increase in NODX were China, Taiwan and Hong Kong. 
"Global demand has picked up, which is helping electronics production," analysts at Moody's Analytics said in a note before the figures were released, adding that conditions were improving for Singapore's exporters.