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NORWEGIAN BALANCE OF
PAYMENTS STATISTICS
Division for national accounts
28 persons
Majority economists
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Introduction to BOP/IIP in Norway
• Short history
– Statistics on external trade in goods and shipping freight income
back to 19th century
– Statistics on stocks of foreign assets and liabilities from 1919
(annually from 1924)
– Balance of Payments statistics from 1940’s
– Adoption of the IMF BPM5 in 1995
– Monthly publishing untill 2004
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Institutional environment
• Compilation and publishing of BoP have been the
responsebility of Statistics Norway since the very beginning
• The Central Bank has untill 2004 supplied monthly Foreign
Exchange data as a main source of information for the BoP
– based on bank accounts settlements data
• Statistics Norway responsible for the other main source
data
– Monthly Foreign Trade in Goods statistics based on customs
declarations supplied electronically by the Customs Directorate
– Annual Shipping transport statistics
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Integration with National Accounts
• Main argument for giving Statistics Norway responsebility
for BoP has been the need to fully integrate BoP with
National Accounts
• From the beginning BoP has been presented with the same
figures as the National Accounts rest of the World Account
• Today the same IT production applications used for BoP
statistics and National Accounts statistics
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The New BoP/IIP data collection system
Background
• In 1989 the last remnants of foreign currency exchange
control system was abolished
• In 2001 it was deceided that the Central Bank will stop
producing the monthly Foreign Exchange statistics.
• Statistics Norway was awarded the task to build a new data
collection system for BoP and the rest of the world Account
of the National Accounts
• In 2005 the very last supply of data from the Central Bank
and the start of the newly constructed data collection
system
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Premesis or conditions for the new data
collection system
• Data to be collected directly from economic agents instead
of indirectly via bank accounts (banking settlements data)
• Priority given to user needs
– fully integration with National Accounts
– international reporting
– other user needs
• Minimising respons burden
– sample surveys
– electronic reporting
• Cost-effective collection
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Sources
SEcTOR
BoP-item
GOODS
SERVICES
INCOME
TRANSFERS
DIRECT
INVESTMENTS
PORTEFOLIO
INVESTMENTS
OTHER
INVESTMENTS
ENTERPRISES
GOVERNMENT
FINANCIAL
OTHER
CUSTOMS DECLARATIONS
DIRECT/
DIRECKT/
DIRECKT/
TOTAL/
SAMPLE/
TOTAL/
ACCOUNTS
ACCOUNTS/
ACCOUNTS
ADM.DATA
DIRECT/
DIRECKT/
DIRECKT/
TOTAL/
SAMPLE/
TOTAL/
ACCOUNTS
ACCOUNTS/
ACCOUNTS
ADM.DATA
DIRECT/
DIRECKT/
DIRECKT/
TOTAL/
SAMPLE/
TOTAL/
ACCOUNTS
ACCOUNTS/
ACCOUNTS
ADM.DATA
DIRECT/
DIRECKT/
DIRECKT/
TOTAL/
SAMPLE/
TOTAL/
ACCOUNTS
ACCOUNTS/
ACCOUNTS
ADM.DATA
DIRECT/
DIRECKT/
DIRECKT/
TOTAL/
SAMPLE/
TOTAL/
ACCOUNTS
ACCOUNTS/
ACCOUNTS
ADM.DATA
DIRECT/
DIRECKT/
DIRECKT/
TOTAL/
SAMPLE/
TOTAL/
ACCOUNTS
ACCOUNTS/
ACCOUNTS
ADM.DATA
HOUSHOLDS/
NPISHS
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DIRECT/
SURVEYS
TRAVEL/
CREDIT CARDS
ESTIMATIONS
BASED ON
STOCKS/
TAX DATA
?
IRRELEVANT
INDIRECT?
INDIRECT?
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The UT project
• Project for new data collection (UT project) launched in
2001.
• Organised as an inter-departemental project within
Statistics Norway – 5 departements initially involved
• Different departements responsible for
– Non-financial enterprises
 Shipping transport services
 Other services exported and imported
 Financial balances and transactions
– Financial enterprises
– Housholds and general government transactions with abroad
• Total budget: 24 man-years
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Infrastructure
•
BoP register
– starting point: the former BoP register of the Central Bank and register of
foreign assets and liabilities of Statistics Norway
– supplemented with information from:
 External Trade in goods register
 newly established register on cross-border payments (no or little detailed
information given)
 newly established register on stock-shareholders (foreign board members)
 media
•
BoP data base
– all survey based information from non-financial enterprises collecetd in a
joint database
 trade in services
 income
 financial balances and transactions
•
Electronic reporting
– web formular
– excell spread sheet
– data extracted directly from enterprise data systems
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Trade in services
• Quarterly and annual sample survey, split between
– shipping transport services
– other services from non-financial industries
• Sample size services survey non-financial sector
– 600 quarterly
– 3 800 annually
• Classification
– Classification of Products by Avctivity (CPA) – 70 items (an
European variant of the UN CPC classification)
• Travel surveys
– residents expenditures on travel abroad – quarterly
– non-residents expenditures on travel in Norway
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Financial accounts data
• Financial sector
– census type data collection in cooperation with the Banking and
Insurance Supervision Commsission
• Non-financial enterprises
– quarterly and annual sample survey
 quarterly: sample size 600 enterprises
 annual: 2 500 enterprises
– based on the official accounts of the reporting enterprises
• General Government
– census type data collection
– information taken directly from government accounts prepared by
Statistics Norway
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The BoP/IIP compilation system
• Current account:
– quarterly sample survey data so far used as an indicator in
developing former levels of exports and imports
– sample survey data not yet grossed up
• Financial accounts:
– to a large extent stocks of foreign assets and liabilities are collected
– data on revaluation partly collected (write-offs etc) and partly
estimated (foreign exchange rates effects)
– financial transactions to a large extent estimated by adjusting total
change in International Investments Positions with revalutations at a
detailed instrument level
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The BoP/IIP compilation system continued
• BoP data on trade in services fully integrated with National
Accounts Supply and Use table
– assessment of exports and imports in relation to domestic
production and uses
– decomposition of change in value of exports and imports of services
into changes in prices and changes in volume
• BoP data on International Investments Positions and
•
•
financial transactions integrated with National Accounts data
on Financial Accounts for all sectors
Balance of Payments and IIP are drawn from same
database
Also statistics on Direct Investments and Foreign Affiliates
Trade Statisics (FATS) to be coordinated with BoP
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Main experiences with the new data
collection system so far
• Initially heavy burden on both reporters and Statisics
Norway
– much effort into talking and explaining to companies/reporters
• But, quality of data improving
– reporters (and we) are learning
• High response rates
• The population (BoP-register) a challenge
– Necessary to combine information from various registers and
sources
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Main BoP experiences
• Quarterly publishing sufficient for user needs
• More costly to serve international organisations with
requested details
– type of services
– geographical (country) allocation
• Break in time series when changing collection system
– totals (exports)
– structure (type of services/income)
– quarterly pattern
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B o P (and Nat Acc) - Data flow - services
TISbase
Non-financial enterprises
External trade in goods
Calculations and coding
Input files
(SAS)
Financial enterprises
Exports –travel (Fame)
Other input
Imports – travel
Banking services
Insurance services
Oil- and gas services
Public services
lje
BoP
(Oracle)
Publishing
(Fame)
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Nat Acc
(Troll/
Fame)
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Publishing and reporting programme
•
•
•
•
Quarterly publishing q+9/10 weeks
Final annual publishing t+23 months
Coordinated with publishing of quarterly and annual National Accounts
Seaparate press release on
– www.ssb.no
– Stat.bank = user friendly data bank
– External economy theme page
•
•
No parties access to data before general release
International reporting to
–
–
–
–
EU statistical office (EUROSTAT) in Luxembourg
OECD
IMF
BIS (Bank of International Settlements)
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Analytical use of BoP/IIP
• Statistics Norway
– National Accounts departement
 integration of BoP with National Accounts strengthen quality of both
statistics
 analusis of rates of return on Norwegian inevstements abroad and
foreign investments in Norway
– Research departement
 quarterly Economic trends (business cycle analysis)
 BoP data and National Accounts data important input of short- and
medium term economic forecast models of Statistics Norway
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Analytical use of BoP/IIP continued
• Departement of Finance
– annual National Budgeting documents
– analysis of external sector of high importance and given high priroity
due to openess of Norwegian economy
• Norges Bank (Central Bank of Norway)
– BoP/IIP data in money supply analysis
– part of the bank’s general monetary policy analysis
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