Another quarterly goods and services surplus at $13.9 billion and a narrowing net income deficit to $12.5 billion, contributed to Australia recording a seasonally adjusted $1.0 billion current account surplus for the December quarter 2019, according to latest information released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS). This is Australia's third consecutive current account surplus.
ABS Chief Economist Bruce Hockman said: "December quarter 2019 marks the third consecutive current account surplus."
"Falling prices for bulk commodities and a decrease in non-monetary gold volumes drove the smaller current account surplus for this quarter. Net exports in volume terms remained steady overall, with rises across several categories offset by the fall in non-monetary gold. As a result, net exports have a limited contribution of 0.1 percentage points to GDP".
Contribution to Gross Domestic Product
In seasonally adjusted chain volume terms, the balance on goods and services surplus increased $0.5 billion, widening the surplus to $8.9 billion, with an expected contribution of 0.1 percentage points to growth in the December quarter 2019 Gross Domestic Product.
International investment position
Australia's net IIP liability position was $891.5 billion at 31 December 2019, a decrease of $83.4 billion on the revised 30 September 2019 position of $974.9 billion.
Australia's net foreign debt liability position decreased $20.9 billion to $1,143.5 billion. Australia's net foreign equity asset position increased $62.6 billion to $252.1 billion at 31 December 2019.
Further details can be found in Balance of Payments and International Investment Position, Australia (cat. no. 5302.0) available for download from http://www.abs.gov.au.
The ABS has published an article Measuring natural disasters in the Australian economy providing an overview of recent natural disasters in ABS measures of the economy.