Eurozone Current Account Surplus Declines

(RTTNews) - The euro area current account surplus declined in February driven by decreases in trade surplus and primary income, data from the European Central Bank showed Friday.

The current account surplus fell to EUR 25 billion from EUR 40 billion in January. In the same period last year, the surplus was EUR 19 billion.

The surplus on goods trade fell notably to EUR 25 billion from EUR 35 billion in the previous month. The services surplus dropped moderately to EUR 16 billion from EUR 17 billion.

Meanwhile, primary income swung to a deficit of EUR 2 billion from a surplus of EUR 4 billion. At the same time, the shortfall in secondary income narrowed to EUR 14 billion from EUR 15 billion in the prior month. In the twelve months to February, the current account surplus totaled EUR 289 billion or 1.8 percent of euro area GDP, down from EUR 371 billion or 2.4 percent a year earlier.

In the financial account, euro area residents' net acquisitions of non-euro area portfolio investment securities came in at EUR 918 billion and non-residents' net acquisitions of euro area portfolio investment securities totalled EUR 1,013 billion in the twelve months to February.