Ottawa — Canada recorded a trade surplus of C $ 3.13 billion in November. This was the largest in more than 13 years, with record exports offsetting the effects of British Columbia floods, Statistics Canada said Thursday.
Analysts surveyed by Reuters predicted a November surplus of C $ 2.03 billion. Imports and exports hit record highs for the second straight month, pushing the surplus to an unprecedented level since C $ 3.45 billion was invested in September 2008.
Peter Hall, chief economist at Canada’s Export Development Agency, said the data show how much global production has recovered from the COVID-19 pandemic.
“The economy is recovering much faster and more reliably than anyone expected or prepared,” he said in a phone call, stating that energy exports recorded an increase of 2.8%. Canada is a major exporter of crude oil and natural gas.
Overall exports increased 3.8% from October, surpassing the effects of the massive floods and landslides that occurred in British Columbia last November, temporarily disconnecting most links to Vancouver, the country’s largest port. it was done.
“This suggests that the preliminary estimate of a 0.3% increase in GDP during the month of November poses a modest upside risk,” said Stephen Brown, senior Canadian economist at Capital Economics. “.
According to Statscan, the data was bloated by unusually high drug shipments. In November, Canada imported and exported COVID-19 medicines for packaging and labeling.
However, even with the removal of medicines, overall exports increased by 2.8% from October. Imports increased 2.4%, but excluding pharmaceuticals shrank to 0.1%.
The Canadian dollar was down 0.1% against the greenback at 1.2762, or $ 78.36, as investors considered the possibility of a faster-than-expected US rate hike.
($ 1 = 1.2762 Canadian dollars)
By David Ljunggren
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