Trade in goods surplus in the EU heads south in May

In May, the euro zone's surplus for products traded with other nations of the world edged down due to the fact that exports slumped and imports rallied, just a month before American duties on EU aluminum and steel came into effect, as official data revealed on Monday.

Eurostat, the European Union's statistics office, told that in May the European Union boasted a goods trade surplus of about 16.5 billion euros versus 19.3 billion in 2017, as follows from non-seasonally updated estimates.

Evidently, the smaller surplus was provoked by a 0.8% dive in exports in contrast with 2017, while imports managed to ascend 0.7%.

The previous week, the European Commission downgraded its surge estimate for the euro zone for this year, referring to trade tensions as one of the key reasons for the deceleration.

Additionally, figures updated for seasonal effects disclosed a sag in the surplus to 16.9 billion euros in May versus April’s outcome of 18.0 billion euros. Euro zone exports tacked on by 0.2% month-on-month, imports edged up by 0.9%.

In May, the trade balance for the entire European Union stood still, demonstrating a marginal surplus of about 0.2 billion euros in contrast with 2.3 billion in 2017, as non-seasonally updated estimates disclosed.

The 28-country trading bloc managed to expand the surplus in its trade in goods with the United States of America, the euro zone’s key trade partner, to about 54.8 billion euros for the period between January and May in contrast with 48.1 billion for the same period of 2017.

For the first five months of 2018, before the American decision on June 1 to introduce import duties on EU aluminum and steel, the European Union ramped up its total exports to the United States by approximately 2.1% and cut its imports by nearly 3.1%.

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