BEA introduced new estimates of receipts and payments for financial services based on its first benchmark survey of financial services transactions between U.S. financial services providers and unaffiliated foreigners for 1994. Services newly covered were financial management services, financial advisory and custody services, credit card services, credit-related services, securities lending services, and electronic funds transfer services. Brokerage services, which had previously been covered by indirect methods of estimation, were replaced by survey reported data for commissions on stock transactions, private stock and bond placements, futures transactions, and foreign exchange transactions. Commissions on trading in outstanding bonds continued to be estimated by BEA using indirect methods of estimation because no explicit fees are charged on those transactions; BEA estimated those commissions as the difference between bid and asked prices. The new estimates begin with the estimates for 1992.
Published