Description: The balance of payments is the statistical statement that systematically summarises, for a specific time period, the economic transactions of an economy with the rest of the world. The balance of payments is broken down into three broad sub-balances: the current account, the capital account, and the financial account. The current account is the major driver of net lending/net borrowing of an economy; it provides important information about the economic relations of a country with the rest of the world. It covers all transactions (other than those in financial items) that involve economic values and occur between resident and non-resident units. The indicator is based on the IMF's sixth Balance of Payments and International Investment Position Manual (BPM6). Because current account data exhibit a strong seasonal pattern, quarterly data are shown as four-quarter moving averages.

Unit: current prices, not seasonally adjusted

Source: National Bank of Belgium (NBB) and National Accounts Institute (INR/ICN) (Belgium), Eurostat (Germany, France, Netherlands) European Central Bank (ECB, euro area