São Paulo – The trade balance registered a surplus of USD 1.035 billion in the month’s fourth week, April 18 to 24, which had four business days. According to data from the period released this Monday (25) by the Ministry of Development, Industry and Foreign Trade (MDIC), exports totaled USD 3.241 billion, and imports, USD 2.206 billion.
In the month’s fourth week, exports reached USD 810.1, an increase of 6.9% over the performance of the first three weeks. Among finished products, exports went up 20% over the performance of up to the third week and reached USD 312 million due to the sales of passenger cars, flexible iron/steel pipes, taps, valves and parts, auto parts, auto engines and ethanol.
Sales of semi-finished products slid 0.7% to USD 94.8 million in the daily average, due to the decline in sales of raw sugar, semi-finished iron and steel products, semi-finished gold, cast iron and unwrought aluminum. Among basic products there was a drop of 0.3% due to weaker sales of soy beans, poultry, copper ore, salted meats and animal offal, casings and stomach.
On the other hand, USD 551.5 million in the daily average was the amount imported in the fourth week. This total means an increase of 4.9% in comparison to the third week. Purchases of fuel and lubricants, electronics, auto and auto parts, plastics and by-products and precision and optical instruments were up.
In the month, exports totaled USD 11.573 billion, and imports, USD 7.990 billion, resulting in a surplus of USD 3.583 billion until last Sunday (24). According to the data provided by MDIC, until the fourth week USD 771.5 million were exported per day on average, which means an increase of 1.8% in comparison to the performance in April 2015. In this comparison, sales of semi-finished products showed an increase of 10.9%, with basic goods going up 1.7%. But finished products declined 0.5%.
With imports, the daily average until the fourth week of this month was USD 532.7 million, or 27.4% less than April of last year. Purchases declined, especially, with steel products, electronics devices, auto and auto parts, plastics and by-products, fuel and lubricants and mechanical equipment. Year-to-date, exports are at USD 52.146 billion, and imports, USD 40.175 billion, resulting in a surplus of USD 11.971 billion. In the same period of 2015, there was a deficit of USD 5.59 billion.
*Translated by Sérgio Kakitani
