Last October, the current account balance recorded a surplus of 880 million dollars, maintaining a surplus for two consecutive months, but only about 1/10 of the same period last year. The goods balance turned into a deficit again in a month.
According to provisional balance of payments statistics released by the Bank of Korea on the 9th, the current account balance in October was recorded as a surplus of 880 million dollars (approximately 1.16 trillion won). It is $700 million lower than September ($1.58 billion) and $7.13 billion less than the same period last year ($8.01 billion).
The cumulative current account surplus from January to October this year was 24.99 billion dollars, but it decreased by 50.43 billion dollars from the same period last year (75.42 billion dollars).
The current account balance recorded a deficit in April after maintaining a surplus for 23 consecutive months from May 2020 to March this year. This is due to a surge in income and an overlap in foreign dividends.
It turned into a surplus in May, a month later, but recorded a deficit of $3.05 billion again in August and returned to the surplus in September.
By category, the goods balance recorded a deficit of 1.48 billion dollars in October. The goods balance recorded a surplus of 470 million dollars in September, turned to surplus in three months, and then turned into a deficit again, a decrease of 7.58 billion dollars from a year ago (6.1 billion dollars).
Exports (52.59 billion dollars) decreased by 6% (3.36 billion dollars) compared to last October, while imports (54.07 billion dollars) increased by 8.55 (4.22 billion dollars). Exports declined for the second month in a row after falling from a year ago in September for the first time in 23 months. Due to the global economic slowdown, performance of semiconductors (-16.4%) and chemical industrial products (-13.4%) were sluggish, and by region, exports to China (-15.7%) and Japan (-13.1%) decreased.
Imports (54.07 billion dollars) increased by 8.5% (4.22 billion dollars) from a year ago. Based on customs clearance, raw material imports increased by 9.9% compared to the same month last year. Among raw materials, gas, coal, and crude oil imports (customs clearance basis) increased by 79.8%, 40.2%, and 24.2%, respectively. Imports of capital goods such as transportation equipment (23.0%) and semiconductors (20.4%) also increased by 10.9%, and imports of consumer goods such as cars (39.6%) and grains (19.9%) increased by 7.9%.
The service account recorded a surplus of $50 million. It decreased by $590 million from last October ($640 million). Although the transport balance remained in the black (1.38 billion dollars), the travel balance recorded a deficit of 540 million dollars following September.
The primary income account recorded a surplus of $2.26 billion and the transfer income account recorded a surplus of $50 million.
Financial account net assets (assets-liabilities) increased by $2.53 billion in October.