This reversed the 1.9% y/y contraction in the trade deficit recorded in H1, resulting in a 3.6% y/y expansion of the trade gap to EUR 25.5 billion. However, this does not yet threaten a deterioration in the deficit-to-GDP ratio this year.
The trade deficit as a share of GDP, calculated on a rolling four-quarter basis, stood at 8.7%, based on estimated Q3 GDP, unchanged from a year earlier. Normally, fiscal consolidation directly and households’ thinner private consumption should have stimulated a slightly narrower trade deficit, but the massive spending under the EU-funded RRF projects as well as the more expensive energy imports must have had an opposite contribution.
In Q3, exports increased by 7.0% y/y to EUR 26.3 billion, while imports expanded faster, by 9.0% y/y to EUR 35.3 billion.
Both exports and imports of mineral fuels rose sharply, by 30% y/y and 27% y/y, respectively. The category contributed 1.8 percentage points (pp) to export growth and 2.4pp to import growth.
The key category behind the wider trade deficit in Q3 was machinery and transport equipment, where exports increased by only 2.4% y/y to EUR 11.2 billion, or 43% of total exports, while imports surged by 12.2% y/y to EUR 13.2 billion, or 37% of total imports.
The car scrappage scheme, under which state subsidies support purchases of new cars, partly imported, may have been a factor. The trade deficit in this category widened by 143% y/y, contributing 15.0pp to the annual dynamics of the overall deficit.
The categories with a lower degree of processing, “crude materials, inedible” and “manufactured goods classified by material”, made positive contributions of 2.3pp and 2.5pp, respectively, partly offsetting the additional imports of machinery and transport equipment.
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