Sharp Decline in Gold Imports from Switzerland Narrows Trade Deficit
The United States saw a significant reduction in its trade deficit in August. The main factor behind the narrowing deficit was a decline in imports due to increased tariffs.
On November 19 (local time), the U.S. Department of Commerce announced that the goods and services trade deficit for August was recorded at 59.6 billion dollars, down 23.8% from the previous month. This figure is lower than the 60.4 billion dollars forecast by experts surveyed by Bloomberg.
Exports increased by 0.1% from the previous month to 280.8 billion dollars, while imports plunged by 5.1% over the same period to 340.3 billion dollars, contributing to the reduction in the deficit.
In particular, the U.S. decision to impose high tariffs on Switzerland, one of the world’s major gold exporters, had a decisive impact on reducing imports.
In August, total goods imports decreased by 18.6 billion dollars, with industrial supplies accounting for the largest drop at 11.3 billion dollars. Gold imports alone fell by a substantial 9.3 billion dollars. Until the United States and Switzerland recently agreed to lower mutual tariffs to 15%, the U.S. had imposed a 39% tariff.
The U.S. trade deficit surged until March as companies increased imports in advance to secure inventory before mutual tariffs took effect in April. However, the deficit began to shrink again once tariffs were imposed in April. Since then, the size of the deficit has fluctuated in response to changes in tariff policy.
Meanwhile, the release of the trade balance data, originally scheduled for October 7, was delayed because the federal government shutdown-the longest in history at 43 days-had only recently ended.
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