India Trade Balance Posts Unexpected Surplus After 18 Years

(Bloomberg) -- India’s trade balance returned to a surplus in June after 18 years, as a decline in imports was sharper than exports.

Exports contracted 12.4% from a year earlier, while imports declined 47.6%, leaving a trade surplus of $790 million, according to data released by the Commerce Ministry Wednesday. The balance was last in surplus in March 2002.

Key Insights

• The median estimate in a Bloomberg survey of economists was for a deficit of $4 billion
• Twelve of the country’s top 30 export items showed growth in June, compared with only four in May, as a reopening of economies around the world stoked demand for goods
• The decline in imports were led by gold, which dropped 77.4% in June to $608.7 million
• Shrinking imports already helped India post a rare current-account surplus in the January-March quarter helped by a lower trade deficit then. That’s a small consolation for an economy headed for its first contraction in more than four decades amid the Covid-19 pandemic
• A new wave of coronavirus infections in economies around the world is a risk, and could leave little room for demand recovery

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• For the full statement on foreign trade, click here

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