News Release

EMBARGOED UNTIL RELEASE AT 8:30 A.M. EDT, Tuesday, June 8, 2021
CB 21-89
BEA 21-25

U.S. International Trade in Goods and Services, Annual Revision

Notice

Updates to Goods and Services

In this release and in the accompanying “U.S. International Trade in Goods and Services, April 2021” release (FT-900), the U.S. Census Bureau and the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) are publishing revised statistics on trade in goods and services. With these releases, statistics on trade in goods, on both a Census basis and a balance of payments (BOP) basis, are revised beginning with 2016, and statistics on trade in services are revised beginning with 2013.

Revised statistics on trade in goods reflect:

  • Corrections and adjustments to previously published not seasonally adjusted statistics for goods on a Census basis.
  • Incorporation of a new BOP adjustment to improve the coverage of aircraft imports on a BOP basis. For more information on BOP adjustments, which are adjustments that BEA applies to goods on a Census basis to convert them to a BOP basis, see the “Goods (balance of payments basis)” section in the FT-900 explanatory notes.
  • Newly available and revised source data for other BOP adjustments.
  • Recalculated seasonal and trading-day adjustments.

Revised statistics on trade in services reflect:

  • Newly available and revised source data, primarily from BEA surveys of international services, including the results of BEA’s benchmark survey of insurance services.
  • Recalculated seasonal adjustments.
  • Revised temporal distributions of quarterly source data to monthly statistics. See the “Services” section in the FT-900 explanatory notes for more information.

This annual revision has not changed the overall trend in the goods and services balance. The annual goods and services deficit was revised by 0.2 percent or less (positive or negative) for 2013–2019. For 2020, the deficit was revised down 0.7 percent, reflecting a 4.9 percent upward revision to the services surplus that was partly offset by a 0.7 percent upward revision to the goods deficit.

The revised statistics for goods on a BOP basis and for services will also be included in the “U.S. International Transactions, First Quarter 2021 and Annual Update” report and in the international transactions interactive database, both to be released by BEA on June 23, 2021. A preview of BEA’s 2021 annual update of the international transactions accounts appears in the April 2021 issue of the Survey of Current Business.

If you have questions, please contact the Census Bureau, Economic Indicators Division, on (800) 549-0595, option 4, or at eid.international.trade.data@census.gov or BEA, Balance of Payments Division, at InternationalAccounts@bea.gov.