U.K. Visible Trade Deficit Widens In June

(RTTNews) - The U.K. visible trade deficit widened in June as the decline in exports of goods outpaced fall in imports, the Office for National Statistics showed Friday.

The visible trade deficit increased to GBP 9.4 billion in June from GBP 9.2 billion in May, and it was larger than the expected shortfall of GBP 8.9 billion.

Reflecting decrease in demand for oil and manufactured goods, exports of goods dropped 1.6 percent in June from May to GBP 23.5 billion. At the same time, imports fell only 0.4 percent, to GBP 32.9 billion.

The falls in both exports and imports of goods in June were attributed to a decrease in trade with countries outside of the European Union.

The trade gap with EU widened to GBP 5.6 billion from GBP 5.1 billion, while that with non-EU nations declined to GBP 3.8 billion from GBP 4.1 billion.

As the surplus on trade in services rose to GBP 7 billion from GBP 6.8 billion, the total trade deficit increased only marginally to GBP 2.5 billion from GBP 2.4 billion.