The Singapore's Ministry of Trade and Industry will release the second quarter economic results on Friday at 8 am.

These will include the overall performance of the economy, sectoral performances, sources of growth, inflation, employment and productivity during the second quarter of 2007.

A Reuters poll says Singapore's economy probably grew strongly in the second quarter due to busy construction and financial industries, but the pace of growth may come in slightly below the government's advance estimate.

Singapore's S$210 billion (US$139 billion) economy was forecast to have grown an annualised 12.4 per cent in the second quarter, after seasonal adjustment -- the strongest pace since the second quarter of 2005 when it expanded 14.5 percent.

That median forecast of eight economists is slightly below the 12.8 percent advance estimate, which was largely based on data from April and May.

Economists said that a drop in June factory output, down a seasonally adjusted 9.4 percent -- its sharpest decline in nearly six years -- may lead to a downward revision of the preliminary data, although strong growth in the property and financial services sectors may counteract weakness in manufacturing.

"There is some downside risk of a revision due to the weakness in manufacturing," said Prakash Sakpal, an economist at ING Financial Markets.

"In the first quarter, everybody expected a downward revision on the back of the March manufacturing number and it turned out that they revised services and construction up. So even if manufacturing cools down, property is still booming," he said.

While the official figures are not due to be announced until early on Friday, Singapore's Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong is likely to make a reference to growth in a televised speech marking the city-state's National Day later on Wednesday.

If the preliminary figures are confirmed, the government is widely expected to upgrade its full-year growth forecast by at least half a percentage point from its most recent forecast of 5-7 percent. The economy grew 7.9 per cent in 2006.

The poll of 10 economists forecast the second quarter grew 8.0 percent from the same period a year earlier, just below the advance estimate of 8.2 percent provided by the Ministry of Trade and Industry on July 10.