Brazil beats trade surplus estimates in September

Trade surplus slipped about 42% in September

Brazil’s trade surplus slipped about 42% in September, official data showed on Friday, a narrower decline than analysts expected, but the government also cut its full-year forecast, reported Reuters. 

The September figure came in at $5.363 billion, the Ministry of Development, Industry, Trade, and Services said, due to stable exports and rising imports. 

Still, it outpaced estimates of a $4.700 billion surplus expected for the month in a Reuters poll of economists.

The ministry cut its forecast for this year’s trade surplus, now expecting $70.4 billion compared with a prior estimate of $79.2 billion. It cut forecasts for both exports and imports, though exports by a higher amount.

“Export prices have been decreasing throughout the year, and the latest data on the volume of global demand showed a small drop,” the ministry’s director of statistics and foreign trade studies, Herlon Brandao, told journalists in Brasilia.

The full-year estimate would represent a sharp slowdown from a record trade surplus of nearly $99 billion logged last year, though it would still be historically high for Latin America’s No. 1 economy. 

Brazil exported $28.8 billion in September, almost stable year-on-year, as lower shipments of oil, iron ore, soy and corn were offset by an increase in coffee, sugar, beef and pulp. 

Meanwhile, imports rose some 20% last month from the previous year to $23.4 billion, boosted by chemical fertilizers and auto parts.

Brazil reported a trade surplus of $59.1 billion in the first nine months of the year, down about 17% from the same period in 2023.