balance of payments
Our trading performance with other countries has a big effect on prospects for the British economy.
Over recent years we have tended to import more goods and services than we have exported. This is shown in the chart below which tracks the quarterly value of exports and imports since the mid 1980s.
THE CURRENT ACCOUNT OF THE BALANCE OF PAYMENTS
The current account is a key indicator for the British economy. It is the sum of four separate trade balances between the UK and the Rest of the World. Firstly, the balance of trade in goods and secondly the balance of trade in services. To this we add Britain's net investment income from external assets and also the net balance of transfers across countries between residents. This gives us the current account balance.
The current account balance for the UK economy is shown in the chart below: The data is for each quarter since 1986.
SUMMARY BALANCE OF PAYMENTS ACCOUNT FOR THE UK
The Balance of Payments accounts comprises the current account plus the capital account (i.e. flows of investment between countries). Summary data for Britain is shown in the table below:
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