MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Latam trade surplus with US tops 100 billion US dollars

Latinamerica and the Caribbean trade surplus with the United States in November dropped 11.5% in November to just over 7 billion US dollars according to the US Department of Commerce.

In the first eleven months of 2006, the region manager a surplus of 101.6 billion US dollars compared to the 91.6 billion in the same period of 2005. Mexico, which together with United States and Canada makes up NAFTA (North American Free Trade Agreement), represents 55% of the region's trade surplus with United States and Venezuela, a crucial supplier of oil takes a 26% share. Mexico's surplus with the US increased from 5.18 billion to 5.44 billion in November which represents 59 billion in the first eleven months of 2006 compared to 45.6 billion in the same period of 2005. Chile from a 243 million US dollars surplus in October dropped to a 384 million deficit in November, accumulating a positive balance of 2.4 billion US dollars in eleven months. January-November 2005, the surplus was just over a billion US dollars. Argentina's trade deficit with US was 51 million US dollars in November compared to 108 million in October. Between January/November Argentina's deficit climbed to 699 million US dollars which contrasts with a 481 million US dollars surplus for the same period in 2005. Brazil's surplus with the US dropped from 618 million US dollars in October to 422 million US dollars in November. In the first eleven months of 2006 the surplus slipped to 7.3 billion US dollars compared to 8.4 billion US dollars in the same period of 2005. Colombia from a surplus of 112 million US dollars in October dropped to a 21 million deficit in November. In the first eleven months of 2006 the Colombian surplus was 2.7 billion US dollars compared to 3.08 billion in the same period of 2005. Venezuela's surplus of 1.87 billion US dollars in October fell to 1.64 in November. In the first eleven months of 2006, the trade surplus increased to 26.2 billion compared to 25.2 billion US dollars in the first eleven months of 2005.