December 2017 Trade Balance

Global economic synchronicity continues according to the latest trade balance data from the Bureau of Economic Analysis. Both sides of the ledger increased during December 2017. America exported $3.5 billion more goods and services for a total of $203.4 billion. Meanwhile, our nation imported $256.5 billion, an uptick of $6.2 billion. As you might have figured, this led to a trade shortfall of $53.1 billion, an increase of $2.7 billion versus a month earlier. 

The goods portion of the narrative was mixed. Foreign-made consumer wares continue to be the major shortcoming for this indicator. Our desire for relatively high quality but inexpensive goods is virtually insatiable and rose 6.1 percent in the period. However, petroleum imports declined sharply in the period as falling demand more than offset the uptick in their price.

Trade in services remained a net-positive for the country, but this surplus deteriorated some. Imports of services rose 0.6 percent to $45.7 billion or $272 billion total. Meanwhile, exports of services managed an uptick of $131 million to $65.9 billion or 0.2 percent. 

Unfortunately, this growing deficit will hurt the revised tally to America’s gross domestic product. Since net-exports are part of the nation’s output equation, this growing shortfall will subtract more from the total than was initially estimated in the preliminary gross domestic product tally. However, there is no need to panic. As noted earlier, both imports and exports grew, so the global economy continues trending higher. America remains an integral part of this trend as our consumers continue demanding wares from our trading partners.