WTI Magazine #58    2015 April, 17
Author : Exportiamo.it      Translation by:

ISTAT data on Foreign Trade in February 2015, give a photo of a cyclical increase in imports and exports with a trade surplus of 3.5 billion euro, increasing if compared to February 2014 (2.4 billion euro). Italian exports gave a positive performance (+ 2.5%) due to the increase in sales both in the EU (+ 0.8%) than outside the EU (+ 4.8%). As for the economic sectors, growth is driven by capital goods (+7.6), the durable consumer goods (+3.9) and energy products (+ 2.7%).

On the import side we have a growth (+ 0.6%) mainly due to the growth of imports from non-EU countries (+ 1.1%) and from the EU (+ 0.2%). As for the economic sectors, the growth of purchases regards all main groups of assets with the exception of intermediate goods (-1.8%) and energy products (-1.3%).

The trade surplus of € 3.4 billion is in large part with EU countries (+2.8 billion euro) but also with non-EU countries (+691 million euro) and, if we take energy out of the picture, the balance is in surplus of around 6.1 billion euro.

As for quarterly level we have an overall increase in exports (+ 1.1%) and a decline in imports (-1.3%) due to the decrease in purchases in Extra-EU (-3.5%) which is not compensated by the slight increase of imports from EU countries (+0.3) The export field has a quarterly sales growth both in the EU (+ 0.8%) and in non-EU (+ 1.5%).

As for trend level we have a good growth in exports (+ 3.7%) due to the growth in sales in EU countries (+ 1.1%) and Extra-EU (+ 7.1%).

The main increase in exports regards capital goods (+ 11.9%) and consumer durables (+6.2) while geographically the largest increases are with the United States (+48 , 5%), Czech Republic (+ 14.3%) and Poland (+ 10.8%).

The growth trend of imports is lower (+ 1.0%) and this is mainly due to the drop in purchases from non-EU (-4.1%). As for sectors, we have significant increases in purchases of capital goods (+ 14.8%)and consumer durables (+ 11.5%). From a geographic point of view, the largest increases in import are with the United States (+ 20.5%), China (+ 18.1%) and Turkey (+ 17.1%).

As for trend level, the average unit values of exports grow (+ 2.4%), but they decrease for imports (-5.6%), while the volumes traded are growing both for exports (+1, 3%) and imports (+ 7.0%).