MARCH KEY FIGURES

			Dec Qtr 2007	Mar Qtr 2008	Dec Qtr 2007 to Mar Qtr 2008
			$m	$m	% change
BALANCE ON CURRENT ACCOUNT
	Trend estimates		-18 230	-19 450	-7
	Seasonally adjusted		-18 716	-19 492	-4
BALANCE ON GOODS AND SERVICES
	Trend estimates		-6 451	-7 717	-20
	Seasonally adjusted		-6 560	-8 019	-22
NET INCOME
	Trend estimates		-11 713	-11 667	-
	Seasonally adjusted		-12 077	-11 400	6
LEVELS AT END OF PERIOD
	International Investment Position		723 320	729 487	1
		Net foreign equity	116 191	113 389	-2
		Net foreign debt	607 130	616 098	1
- nil or rounded to zero (including null cells)

Current Account, Main aggregates - Trend estimates at current prices (a)

International Investment

MARCH KEY POINTS


BALANCE OF PAYMENTS

• The current account deficit, seasonally adjusted, rose $776m (4%) to $19,492m. The deficit on the balance of goods and services rose $1,459m (22%) to $8,019m. The income deficit fell $677m (6%) to $11,400m.
• In seasonally adjusted chain volume terms there was an increase of $1,919m (18%) in the deficit on goods and services. This could be expected to detract -0.7 percentage points from growth in the March quarter 2008 volume measures of GDP.

INTERNATIONAL INVESTMENT POSITION (IIP)

• Australia's net IIP rose $6.2b to a net liability position of $729.5b. Net foreign debt was $616.1b, an increase of $9.0b. Net foreign equity decreased by $2.8b to a liability of $113.4b.

NOTES

FORTHCOMING ISSUES

ISSUE (QUARTER)	Release Date
June 2008	1 September 2008
September 2008	2 December 2008
December 2008	3 March 2009

REVISIONS

Table 36 summarises revisions, in original current price terms, since the last issue of this publication, for the last three years and six quarters.


CHANGES IN THIS ISSUE

General Government foreign debt liabilities and net foreign debt for March quarter 2008 have been confidentialised in Table 30, Foreign Debt Levels. This is due to a request from the relevant Minister that identifiable information about the activities of the Future Fund be confidentialised. The information will remain confidential in all releases published up to and including 30 June 2008.

A revised front page format has been introduced in this issue. This enables more information to be provided in the 'key points' section explaining reasons for movements in components and balances and unusual occurrences during the quarter.


CHANGES IN FORTHCOMING ISSUES

The global financial crisis has caused changes in the structure and behaviour of financial markets. Sudden shifts in structural relationships which have existed for some time mean that data supplied by businesses to the ABS and ABS editing and compilation practices may not reflect the impact of these changes fully and in a timely manner.

The ABS is working with providers and reviewing and updating, where needed, a range of methods relating to the collection and compilation of financial sector output, income, transactions, positions and prices. Improvements have been incorporated into this publication and some will be incorporated into future publications, leading to revisions.

One of these reviews relates to the calculation of accrued income on long-term debt securities. In addition, methodology and data sources for compiling compensation of employees have been improved. Both of these reviews will be implemented in the June quarter 2008 issue and will result in revisions.

An information paper Impact of introducing Revision 4 of the Standard International Trade Classification (cat. no. 5368.0.55.010) was released on 26 May 2008. The paper outlines statistical impacts resulting from changes to the classification of Australian import and export statistics. This information paper can be accessed on the ABS web site www.abs.gov.au. The ABS will implement the changes to the classifications from the September 2008 reference quarter. This will impact on data released in this and related publications.


INQUIRIES

For further information contact Selvi Sekhar on Canberra (02) 6252 5540 for balance of payments estimates, and Val Tot on Canberra (02) 6252 5541 for international investment estimates.