The US trade deficit increased by 17.7% in the whole of 2020

The trade deficit in the United States It increased 17.7% in 2020, But it recorded a 3.5% decline in December, due to lower exports due to the coronavirus pandemic, the Ministry of Commerce said.

In 2020, The deficit jumped to $ 678,740 million. The balance of red goods scored 915.790 million and services with a surplus of 237.050 million.

The merchandise trade gap with China, which was the epicenter of the contention during the Trump administration, narrowed by $ 34.4 billion to $ 310.8 billion last year due to a small spike in exports and a slight drop in imports.

Hence, the decline was nearly 10% year over year and 7.56% in December.

Regarding the exchange of services, no data was provided, so comparison with the data for 2019, when The total deficit was 307.840 million.

For its part, Beijing announced that China’s surplus with the United States has expanded further in the past year, which was seen as a setback for Trump, who fought a battle with the Asian giant.

According to data from China, the trade surplus for 2020 increased 7.1% to $ 316.9 billion with the United States.

Last year, amid the epidemic, demand for remote medical and electronic products boosted Chinese exports to the United States.

But in the opposite direction, restrictions imposed on the United States prevented the export of the level of services in previous years to China.

Before the global health crisis, imports of goods from China had already declined due to punitive tariffs being imposed on a large number of Chinese goods. However, far from reducing the total amount of the US trade deficit, this trade war has altered trade flows.

For example, The commodity deficit with Mexico jumped 11.16% in the yearUp to $ 112,750 million.

On the other hand, the epidemic halted trade with Canada, its historic trading partner: thus the commodity deficit decreased by 44% to 14.970 million.