The negative trade balance with the rest of the world reached $84.4 billion, up 19.2% compared to August. Analysts were counting on only 74 billion.
The United States trade deficit soared in September, increasing much more than expected, under the cumulative effect of a drop in exports and an increase in imports, according to data published Tuesday by the department of Commerce.
The deficit in goods and services with the rest of the world reached 84.4 billion dollars in September, up 19.2% compared to August, a much more marked increase than expected by analysts who instead forecast a deficit of 74 billion, according to the consensus published by Briefing.com.
“Companies’ anticipation of the dockers’ strike very likely explains this,” said Ryan Sweet, economist for Oxford Economics, interviewed by AFP, “we should observe an opposite effect in the coming months. For me, the increase in the deficit is not a cause for concern.
Over one year, the American trade deficit also increased to 11.8% in September, or $69.6 billion more, the Commerce Department also said, this time due to a more marked increase in imports. than exports, a sign that American household consumption remains strong.
“An important component is to be found on the side of domestic demand,” Rubeela Farroqi, chief economist for HFE, reminded AFP, “which was already visible in the household expenditure data during the GDP publications for the third quarter. We’ll see if it continues.”
In September, exports of goods fell by $3.2 billion, those of services being almost stable compared to the previous month.
On the goods side, the decline concerns almost all of the country’s main industries, while services experienced a slight decline in maintenance and repair, offset by an equivalent increase in government goods and services as well as transport.
For imports, the increase primarily concerns goods, which increased by $10.9 billion, while services fell slightly, by $600 million.
Americans overall purchased more imported vehicles, pharmaceutical products, computers and semiconductors but traveled less abroad.
For goods, the geographic distribution of the trade deficit remains generally unchanged, the largest still being linked to trade with China, at $26.9 billion, up significantly over one month.
The European Union (EU) still remains in second position, with an American trade deficit of 23.8 billion dollars, once again increasing quite markedly, and which is again concentrated on the same four countries: Germany, France, Ireland and Italy. The surplus, however, is widening in trade with the Netherlands.
Finally, the deficits with Mexico and Vietnam are still among the largest outside China and the EU, and are also up compared to the previous month.
