Group items tagged

"The U.S. trade deficit widened more than expected in September as imports rose to their highest level in almost a year. The Commerce Department said the trade gap increased 8.0 percent to $41.8 billion, the largest since May. August's shortfall on the trade balance was revised slightly to $38.7 billion from the previously reported $38.8 billion. Economists polled by Reuters had expected the trade deficit to widen a bit to $39.0 billion in September. When adjusted for inflation, the trade gap widened to $50.4 billion, the largest since May, from $47.4 billion the prior month. This measure goes into the calculation of gross domestic product. The increase in the so-called real trade deficit in September suggested the government will probably lower its initial third-quarter GDP estimate." This does not surprise me at all with their trade balance widening because of the debt they are in. Their debt are in the trillions and there isn't a lot the US are doing. Yes, their economy might be improving slightly but a lot of people are without jobs creating a sort of dilemma.

I find this article thoroughly bizarre. Apparently, South African had this huge deficit calculated to be 116.9 billion rand. I don't what the exchange rate on their currency is, but that part isn't that surprising. What's surprising, at least to me and nobody else in this article, it seems, is that they reduced the deficit to about 34.6 billion by-- get this --redoing their calculations. They neglected to include trade with foreign neighbors, which just so happened to help out their balance of accounts. I can see why the recalculation helped to clear things up and, essentially, made South Africa's situation better, but it's weird how the article refers to it as if the deficit "decreased" because the numbers were run under differing conditions. Am I crazy?

This article is about the Cayman Islands and how their balance of trade is improving for services.

This article describes how oil has become less elastic through the past years. It also discusses the balance between the scarcity of oil and the demand being supplied and the quantity demand. Oil is still in the ground, and it has been supplied frequently the past ten years, but there is some economical decisions to make to set the standard for the future of oil.

The demand of oil has been increasing over the past year which is playing a role on the demand and supply balance. Because the demand in oil is increasing, the price of the oil would also increase. It takes longer for oil to be drilled from the ground which causes the oil to take longer time and a change to the response in price. "In economic terms, the oil supply is becoming less elastic as new oil supplies come increasingly from unconventional oil." The demand for oil reflects on how much we need oil in our everyday life. Individual people can reduce the amount of oil they use by using public transportation, if where you want to go is close by. This saves gas and oil because you do not need your car and the bus would carry a lot of people.

This article describes the change in oil prices on the population. The article states that the supply of oil is becomming less elastic and therefore there is a increase in price. The way to win oil becomes harder, because deeper holes have to be made to extract it from the earth. The article furthermore looks into changes from an economical point of view. It looks at examples of what can be changed and where changes have been made.

The article talks about deflation and trade balance relating topics in Japan.

Japan's exports have been rising at an extremely fast rate for the last 3 years although the trade balance seems to remain mired with the Japanese imports expected to increase due to the shuttering of its nuclear power industry.

The article deals with the different wants of russian people. A lot of them prefer to drink beer rather than vodka. This means that more beer is sold. This influences the health of a lot of people. To stop this trend the government implemented a huge tax on beer. The tax rose by 200%. This shows that the government always tries to find a balance.

This is a very small article, but it summarizes how the Italian budget deficit will be decreased as the EU will help the government. In fact, the EU will work with the Italian government to repay the debts, therefore decreasing the national debts and help the government reach a balanced budget.

This article talks about the increase in demand of gold and the amount of price paid to get gold between 2010 and 2011. The demand of gold increased by 11% from the first quarter of 2010 to the first quarter of 2011 while the price increased by 40%. The increase in demand directly increases the supply of gold because if people want it, the rate of mining would increases so that gold is available at all time. Also, the amount of money spent on the gold would also increase because gold does not grow and one day gold would finish. The people who sell the gold would therefore put additional money on the price of the gold to get their own profit. This process would however continue because every time gold is found, the amount of gold left in the earth reduces. This allows the seller to always increase the price of the gold which means that there can never be a balance between the price and the demand. As the demand of gold increases, the price of gold decreases and the amount of gold left on earth decreases. Looking at the chart in the article, we can see that if the demand of gold increases the supply of gold would also increase but there was a slight decrease in the years 2007 to 2009. The article states that 'China's total annual gold demand topped 700 metric tons for the first time ever last year and is expected to keep rising over the next decade'.

This article for me was the perfect example to show how the human needs have trouble coexisting with the finite amount of resources present. Fred Neumann, co-head of Asian economic research at HSBC Holdings said, "Countries such as China have seen droughts over many years. Now we see other parts of the world facing some water shortages, which is starting to impact the global price of certain goods."In this article it basically states the fact that some areas are running low on water and simply cannot keep up with the growing demand for food. Thus instead of having a balance the price of food increased at an alarming rate.

This article talks about the trade deficit in Japan due to imports of smartphones, the recent earthquake and the consequences of nuclear energy. The trade deficit happened due to numerous numbers of imports against exports. Since Japan's nuclear energy accident, Japan switched to thermal generators and needed/still need to import fossil fuels, which is taking a big part in the trade deficit. In addition, the gadget industry is focusing on smart phones, and this is causing the massive imports of iPhone's and Android's to Japan impacting the market and the people. Also, after the earthquake of 2010, there has been a recover, but not to the level Japan needs to overcome the trade deficit.

The article discusses how the U.S. trade deficit shot up nearly 10% to $36.4 billion in November, hitting its highest point since last January, the Department of Commerce said Tuesday. But even as imports soared, exports also grew -- for the seventh straight month. And some cheered the greater trade activity.

The article talks about the improvement in the trade account. It also states that the current account deficit is going down. The reason for this is that India's exports grew.

The U.S. trade deficit widened slightly in August as exports slipped, suggesting trade will probably not be much of a boost to growth in the third quarter. The import growth is weak and consistent with sluggish domestic demand. So in fact this article is about the goods and services account under the current account. The possible reasons for such trade deficit may be a decrease of foreign demand for US exports, decreased domestic interest rates and speculators' anticipations for the US dollar to rise, which means that there will be a tendency for the price of US dollar to appreciate. This leads to even less competitive exports. If I look at this situation from another perspective, more currency flowed out for imports than it flowed in for exports, creating the debit item and exacerbating the current account.

The article discusses the story of the shrinking U.S. trade deficit is essentially the story of the U.S. oil boom. The last time the U.S. came close to balancing out the trade deficit, at least in terms of its share of GDP, was just after a recession ended in 1991. The big issue is whether the U.S. can continue to expand its economy while also shrinking its trade deficit-something it hasn't been able to do for a generation or more. The U.S. will start exporting natural gas at some point over the next few years.

Japan's trade deficit nearly doubled in October, as growth in imports outpaced robust increases in exports to the U.S. and China, the Finance Ministry reported Wednesday. A weakening in the Japanese yen over the past year has helped exports, but it has also increased the cost in yen terms... This is the importance of looking at **how** payments balance. Though Japan has seen some significant increases in exports, most notably in the vehicle and chemical industries, too much money is still leaving Japan. Part of this may be due to the fact that many Japanese firms depend on foreign manufacturing. The government has plans to revitalize a large manufacturing sector of Japan, but the question now is how quickly and how much will it help?

"Japan's trade deficit nearly doubled on-year to a bigger-than-expected $10.9 billion in October as the country's energy bill soared... " Japan's trade deficit was the biggest in the last 44 years and entered a 16-month trade deficit run. The reason behind this is because of the transfer from energy sources. Until 2010, Japan was the first in using nuclear energy in the world. When the accident in Fukushima happened, Japan had to start using fossil fuels and started importing it increasing their trade deficit.

This shows how the trade deficit is increasing in the UK, which will disturb the equilibrium (Balance of payment).