Search
All
Economics
Politics

Don’t Miss a Post. Subscribe now.

The US Goods and Services Trade Deficit Hovers Near Record Level

•

•

12 comments on The US Goods and Services Trade Deficit Hovers Near Record Level

•

Balance of trade data from Census Department, chart by Mish

Trade Deficit Summary

  • The U.S. Census Bureau and the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis announced  the Goods and Services Trade Deficit.
  • In January, the deficit hit a record $89.23 billion. For February, the deficit stands at $89.19 Billion. 
  • The three-month average deficit is a record $86.79. 
  • The services surplus peaked at $26.72 billion in January of 2018 and has generally been sliding since.
  • For February, the services surplus is $18.29 billion.

Goods Exports and Imports 

  • Exports of goods increased $2.8 billion to $158.8 billion in February.
  • Imports of goods increased $1.7 billion to $266.2 billion in February.

Year-to-Date 

  • 2022 is off to a very bad start.
  • Year-to-date, the goods and services deficit increased $45.7 billion, or 34.5 percent, from the same period in 2021. 
  • Exports increased $68.0 billion or 17.6 percent. Imports increased $113.7 billion or 22.0 percent.

Notable Countries

  • Mexico: The deficit with Mexico decreased $2.7 billion to $9.8 billion in February. Exports increased$0.6 billion to $25.5 billion and imports decreased $2.1 billion to $35.3 billion.
  • Japan: The deficit with Japan decreased $2.0 billion to $5.1 billion in February. Exports increased $0.9 billion to $7.1 billion and imports decreased $1.1 billion to $12.3 billion. 
  • China: The deficit with China increased $7.9 billion to $41.2 billion in February. Exports increased $0.2 billion to $13.0 billion and imports increased $8.1 billion to $54.2 billion.

Trump’s “Historical Trade Deal” With China Final Results Are a Big Zero

The results of President Trump’s historical trade deal with China are in. 

For details, please see Trump’s “Historical Trade Deal” With China Final Results Are a Big Zero

Why Perpetual Deficits?

This setup is a direct result of 2 things.

1. US having world’s reserve currency

2. Nixon closing the gold window.

Perpetual trade deficits are why China does not want to have the world’s reserve currency even if it met the requirements. The US is stuck with it, albeit in a now diminishing role thanks to de-globalization. 

The Yuan Will Not Replace the US Dollar

For discussion of the reserve currency and why we can rule out the yuan, please see The Yuan Will Not Replace the US Dollar, Nor Will It Be Backed by Commodities

There is a huge difference between de-dollarization and de-globalization and loss of reserve currency status.

De-Globalization: New Supply Chains Are Inefficient and Will Drive Up Inflation

This post originated on MishTalk.Com.

Thanks for Tuning In!

Please Subscribe to MishTalk Email Alerts.

Subscribers get an email alert of each post as they happen. Read the ones you like and you can unsubscribe at any time.

If you have subscribed and do not get email alerts, please check your spam folder.

Mish

Subscribe to MishTalk Email Alerts.

Subscribers get an email alert of each post as they happen. Read the ones you like and you can unsubscribe at any time.

This post originated on MishTalk.Com

Thanks for Tuning In!

Mish

Mike Shedlock

Recommended Articles

Comments to this post are now closed.

12 Comments
Newest
Oldest Most Voted
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
vanderlyn
vanderlyn
4 years ago
CHINA has been laying off all the bad USD for 20 years. they enter into very long term contracts to lease or purchase commodities around the world, from sudan date farms to forests and mines………..in africa and south america and canada. they already pawned off the bad money and getting real hard assets that humans need. only people seem to get this are FX traders and economist newspaper. last thing in the world is the chinese wanting to end this charade. for decades i heard amerikan financiers brag about we get products from china and they get our crummy debt and paper money. the joke is on us empire. things will change. they always do.
0
0
Tony Bennett
Tony Bennett
4 years ago
Per MND the average 30yr mortgage topped 5% today … just a few bps from taking out a 2018 high … then all the way back to 2011.
Housing 2022
R.I.P.
0
0
Tony Bennett
Tony Bennett
4 years ago
Latest estimate: 0.9 percent — April 5, 2022

The GDPNow model estimate for real GDP growth (seasonally adjusted annual rate) in the first quarter of 2022 is 0.9 percent on April 5, down from 1.5 percent on April 1. After releases following the April 1 GDPNow update from the US Census Bureau, the US Bureau of Economic Analysis, and the Institute of Supply Management, the nowcasts of first-quarter real personal consumption expenditures growth and first-quarter real gross private domestic investment growth decreased from 4.2 percent and -0.6 percent, respectively, to 3.5 percent and -1.0 percent, respectively, while the nowcast of the contribution of the change in real net exports to first-quarter real GDP growth decreased from -1.31 percentage points to -1.41 percentage points.

0
0
Dutoit
Dutoit
4 years ago
what about this ?
“In short, the financial war on Russia gave the West an unmistakable
lesson from Moscow that the hardest currencies are not USD or EUR, but
rather oil, gas, wheat, and gold. Yes, energy, food and strategic
resources are currencies.”
0
0
Business Man
Business Man
4 years ago
Thanks for your always valuable information, Mish.
Thinking about this more deeply, does anyone–including Mish–have a theory or hypothesis as to what will eventually happen if these numbers continue in this pattern? How are currencies, interest rates and inflation affected (as a result of the Chinese holding Treasuries — or not?)
0
0
Mish
Mish
4 years ago
Reply to  Business Man
This setup is a direct result of 2 things.
1. US having world’s reserve currency
2. Nixon closing the gold window.
It is also why China does not want to have the world’s reserve currency even if it met the requirements. The US is stuck with it.
Going to add this to the post
0
0
Tony Bennett
Tony Bennett
4 years ago
Reply to  Mish
“It is also why China does not want to have the world’s reserve currency even if it met the requirements.”
…
Yes. And I’m putting China on the clock for devaluation. The yen move has to make Beijing extremely uncomfortable.
0
0
StukiMoi
StukiMoi
4 years ago
Reply to  Business Man
“…what will eventually happen..”
Chinese wages, hence purchasing power, will rise relative to those of Americans. Partly nominally, but also due to Yuan appreciation versus dollars. As Argentines demonstrated (more than ones by now…), nothing kills trade deficits as dead as getting officially poor.
Americans will afford much less in the way of Chinese manufactured imports. While the Chinese will be able to afford more American oil, gas and other commodities (just in time for the Dollar-sorta-pegged Europeans to have finished building their expensive LNG terminals in anticipation of cheap US shale gas….). And Americans become more attractive as cheap labor for Chinese companies. All three contributing to a reduction in trade deficits.
0
0
Maximus_Minimus
Maximus_Minimus
4 years ago
Reply to  StukiMoi
I’ve read some article after Hong Kong handover to China, that many of the menial jobs in construction were being filled by white coolies from UK. These jobs were shunned by the locals.
Probably anecdotal, but somewhat a reflection of how education is valued in the Anglo-Saxon world.
Visit any IT department in the American heartland.
0
0
Christoball
Christoball
4 years ago
Reply to  Maximus_Minimus
The importance of IT is transitional.
0
0
StukiMoi
StukiMoi
4 years ago
Reply to  Christoball
IT in the narrow sense will not become any more unimportant than any other engineering role massively important for the entire world’s infrastructure. Like road building, shipbuilding, medicine etc.
What eventually will change, and never really got nearly as silly in Asia anyway, is the current Western predicament that the only person in almost any room who can even be considered functionally literate, is the “IT guy.” With the rest existing in a state hardly above all-out braindeath. Which ends up making the “IT guy” singularly important for anything at all to be accomplished.
Even in The West, that’s a somewhat recent phenomenon. All the “Legends” of the “Computer science revolution” worked under the assumption that the tools they built were to be utilized by “everyone,” in order to improve their ability to do their “job,” or whatever else they were attempting. Not by some “IT department” staffed by aliens; while everyone else existed on, at best, dripfeeds of prepackaged triviality in some ghetto.
The fundamental contribution of the electronic computer revolution, is that it allows for the collection and processing of and acting on orders of magnitude greater datasets than what was previously possible. But to be able to utilize that, people need the brains and languages and tools to precisely and efficiently formulate and express their intended interactions with all that data. To put it in shorthand, they need to be able to speak clearly. Currently, due to the massive shortage of people who can do that, the few who do (outside of parts of academia) are almost invariable herded into “IT departments”, since that is where such inabilities are the most glaringly obvious. With the end result that darned near EVERYONE else, don’t even have the brains to progress beyond wondering what the meaning of is, is.
0
0
davidyjack
davidyjack
4 years ago
Unsustainable.
0
0

Decorate Your Walls with Mish Fine Art Images

Click each image to view details or purchase in the store.

Stay Informed

Subscribe to MishTalk

You will receive all messages from this feed and they will be delivered by email.