European Central Bank said, the current account of the euro area recorded a surplus of €16 billion in December 2018, decreasing by around €7 billion compared with November 2018. Surpluses were recorded for goods (€16 billion), services (€11 billion) and primary income (€3 billion). These were partly offset by a deficit for secondary income (€13 billion).

According to preliminary results for 2018 as a whole, the current account recorded a surplus of €343 billion (3.0% of euro area GDP), compared with one of €362 billion (3.2% of euro area GDP) in 2017. This decrease was due to a lower surplus for goods(down from €340 billion to €289 billion) and a marginally higher deficit for secondary income (up from €146 billion to €147 billion), which were only partly offset by higher surpluses for services (up from €102 billion to €121 billion) and primary income (up from €66 billion to €80 billion).

In the financial account, euro area residents made net acquisitions of foreign portfolio investment securities of €107 billion in 2018 (decreasing from €641 billion in 2017). Non-residents’ net purchases of euro area portfolio investment securities amounted to €38 billion (down from €374 billion in 2017).