STATISTICAL PRESS RELEASE
19|2016
Balance of Payments
December 2015
February 18th, 2016
Banco de Portugal publishes today, in tables A.16
The year-on-year growth rate for exports, of 4.7 per
and A.17 of the Statistical Bulletin and in BPstat, the
balance of payments statistics for December 2015.
The data disclosed includes revisions since January
cent (with 3.7 per cent for goods and 6.6 per cent
for services), was higher than the corresponding
growth rate for imports, 3.2 per cent (with 2.5 per
2012, following the statistics revision policy of
Banco de Portugal.
cent for goods and 6.1 for services). It should be
highlighted the positive evolution of the “Travel”
item, especially on the export side (Chart 3).
In 2015, the balance of current and capital accounts
amounted to 3.1 billion euros (1.7 per cent of
GDP1), representing an increase of 300 million euros comparing to the same period of 2014 (Chart
1). For this evolution contributed all current account
components, except primary income, which was influenced by a larger deficit in the investment income and less EU funds received. This last effect
was also reflected in the balance of capital account
(Chart 2).
The balance of goods and services account increased by 1.1 billion euros as compared with 2014.
Chart 1 • Current and capital accounts
The financial account registered an increase in net
foreign assets, mainly from General Government
and from Other Monetary Financial Institutions. In
the first case, the increase resulted essentially from
the early partial repayment of the loan obtained
from the IMF under the Economic and Financial Assistance Programme. In the case of the financial
sector, the increase resulted mainly from the redemption of debt securities by Portuguese banks.
The central bank registered a decrease of net foreign assets (Chart 4).
Chart 2 • Current and capital accounts balance,
by main components
20 000
6 000
5 000
Million euros
10 000
Million euros
4 000
3 000
2 000
0
-10 000
1 000
-20 000
0
2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015
-1 000
jan feb mar apr may jun
2013
2014
jul
aug sep oct nov dec
2015
Goods and services
Income
Capital account
Current and capital account
BANCO DE PORTUGAL • Balance of Payments
Chart 4 • Net external assets change, by institutional sector
40 000
20 000
1 500
20 000
10 000
Million euros
2 000
1 000
500
0
0
-20 000
Million euros
Chart 3 • Services and travel accounts (monthly
developments)
Million euros
2
-10 000
0
dec-14
mar-15
jun-15
sep-15
dec-15
-40 000
-20 000
2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015
Travel - exports
Services - balance
Travel - imports
Travel - balance
Central bank
Finantial corp, excl. central bank
Net foreign assets changes [rh scale]
General government
Non-financial corp. and households
The estimation of the GDP for 2015 was calculated by the Banco de Portugal based on information released by INE, namely the volume
changes for the 4th quarter.
1
Additional data available at:
Table A.16 of Statistical Bulletin
Table A.17 of Statistical Bulletin
Statistical domain of balance of payments of BPstat|Estatísticas online
Balance of payments statistics – Methodological notes (only in Portuguese)
The statistics revision policy of Banco de Portugal
Next update: March 17th, 2016
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