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Why Global Trade Imbalances Could Get Worse Before They Get Better

Brad Setser Council on Foreign Relations

Date Posted:: September 23, 2019
Is Database:: Database

Global trade imbalances are driven by significant surpluses in Europe & East Asia, with the U.S. absorbing much of these surpluses. A large U.S. deficit is necessary for global trade to balance. @Brad_Setser

Global trade imbalances are primarily driven by significant surpluses in Europe and East Asia, with the U.S. absorbing much of these surpluses through its trade deficit. The U.S. trade deficit in manufactures is roughly equal to the combined current account surpluses of Europe and East Asia. While the U.S. runs a modest surplus on intellectual property trade and offshore investments, its total current account deficit remains below the combined surplus of these regions. For global trade to balance, a significant U.S. deficit is necessary, as China, the euro area, and Japan maintain substantial surpluses. This imbalance suggests that global trade imbalances could worsen before improving, as the structural need for a large U.S. deficit persists in the current economic landscape.

Good chart, according to Brad East Asia's regional savings rate is 40%, in a low interest rate world.

Why Global Trade Imbalances Could Get Worse Before They Get Better: Extended Excerpt Image 1

"...As a result, trade imbalances run mostly along an east-west axis these days. Across the Atlantic, where the United States, Canada, and Mexico absorb a portion of Europe’s surplus. And across the Pacific, where the United States, Canada, and Mexico absorb East Asia’s surplus. It is of course too simple to reduce everything to a single number—but in very rough terms, the U.S. trade deficit in manufactures right now just happens to be about equal to the combined current account surpluses of Europe and East Asia....More importantly, looking only at manufacturing leaves out the surplus that the U.S. runs on intellectual property trade (which is fairly modest because of tax considerations) and the surplus the United States runs on its offshore investments (the entire surplus on foreign direct investment income comes from the seven main low tax jurisdictions these days, see Martin Wolf). The United States' total current account deficit is now below the combined surplus of Europe and East Asia—but it's still clearly the case that global trade cannot balance today without a sizable U.S. deficit. If China, the euro area and Japan all have significant surpluses, someone big needs to have a significant deficit for global trade to add up.

Brad Setser, "Why Global Trade Imbalances Could Get Worse Before They Get Better…," Council on Foreign Relations, September 20, 2019, https://www.cfr.org/blog/why-global-trade-imbalances-could-get-worse-they-get-better

How To Buy A Trade Surplus

Joseph Gagnon and Nishtha Agrawal Peterson Institute For International Economics

Date Posted:: July 29, 2026
Is Database:: Database
Is Important:: Important

Using annual data for 146 countries from 1985 – 2024, Gagnon and Agrawal find that a $1 increase in a country’s cyclically adjusted fiscal deficit is associated with a 22–38¢ increase in its current-account deficit, with most of the estimates ~30¢.

Table 1 presents regression results. The evidence strongly suggests that governments can buy current account surpluses. Raising the fiscal balance by $1 tends to raise the current account by $0.30 [Table 1, first row]. Issuing $1 of domestic currency debt to buy foreign-currency assets (foreign exchange intervention) raises the current account anywhere from $0.20 to $1.00, with a value around $0.50 to $0.60 most plausible [Rows 2 though 5]. NOF is Net Official Flows, and NOS is the stock of net official foreign assets. The most powerful policy, as exemplified by Norway and Singapore, is to run a fiscal surplus and invest the proceeds in foreign-currency assets. In that case, $1 buys a current account surplus of around $0.80 or so. The results are supported by annual panel regressions of current accounts and cross-country stock regressions of cumulated current accounts or stocks of net foreign assets. The estimated effects in the panel regressions may be biased down slightly by incomplete modeling of lagged effects.

Honey, Who Shrunk the U.S. Income Surplus?

Matthew Higgins and Thomas Klitgaard Liberty Street Economics

Date Posted:: May 19, 2026
Is Database:: Database

The US net international investment position worsened by about $16tn between 2019 and 2025, driven by roughly $5.5tn in net inflows and $10tn in valuation losses, as higher rates hit a larger net liability stock, raising interest rate-sensitivity.

Foreign holdings of U.S. financial assets are immense, with official estimates putting their current market value at $69 trillion. U.S. holdings of foreign assets are also impressive but much smaller, at $41 trillion. The shortfall in U.S. foreign assets relative to foreign liabilities has been mounting for decades. Yet U.S. investment income receipts—in profits, dividends, and interest—comfortably exceeded income payments until recently. Payments on U.S. assets owned by foreign investors represent a servicing burden for the U.S. economy. Profits, dividends, and interest payments that would otherwise accrue to domestic investors instead flow abroad. Given the need to sell U.S. assets to finance ongoing trade deficits, this servicing burden seems likely to mount. The related buildup in the U.S. net liability position in interest-bearing assets will also make the income balance more sensitive to swings in interest rates. This increased sensitivity is already in evidence. At present, with the asset-liability gap at -$15 trillion, a 1 percentage point increase in U.S. and foreign interest rates would subtract $150 billion from the U.S. net income balance. (A 1pp fall in rates would result in a similar improvement.) Only five years ago, a 1 percentage point rise in rates would have subtracted $100 billion.

Takeaways by Macro Roundup^® AI

The $28tn gap between foreign holdings of U.S. assets ($69tn) and U.S. foreign holdings ($41tn) drives mounting income payments abroad.
A 1pp interest rate rise now subtracts $150bn from U.S. net income—50% more than five years ago—as the $15tn net.
Ongoing trade deficits force asset sales to foreign investors, leading to larger servicing burdens and greater exposure to interest rate.

Don't Blame America's Current Account Deficit On the Dollar

Maurice Obstfeld Peterson Institute for International Economics

Date Posted:: April 14, 2026
Is Database:: Database

Noting the minimal relationship between official liabilities and the CA, Obstfeld argues that the reserve currency role of the dollar is not the cause of the trade deficit. He urges reduction in the US fiscal deficit to increase national saving.

Critics of the dollar's global role have argued that foreign official dollar purchases (labeled US incurrence of official liabilities in the figure) feed one-for-one into US current account deficits. To illustrate the true loose relationship between these two variables, the figure shows both of them over the 2003–25 period, as percentages of GDP. US net incurrence of liabilities to official holders, reported with a minus sign as in standard balance-of-payments methodology, is usually far too small to mirror the US current account deficit. And since roughly 2014, net official financial inflows have fluctuated around zero as the current account deficit has widened. To be sure, the strong international demand for dollars may make the dollar stronger against foreign currencies than it would be otherwise, [but] while they imply a smaller current account balance, they do not necessarily imply a negative balance and certainly not a rising negative balance, especially when foreign dollar reserve holdings have been shrinking relative to global economic activity (as figure 1 also implies). The euro is the world's second reserve currency, yet the euro area has a current account surplus. Britain had surpluses up until World War I despite issuing the world's premier global currency and hosting its leading financial center. Reducing the US fiscal deficit materially and sustainably is the most important US policy prerequisite for global current account rebalancing.

Takeaways by Macro Roundup^® AI

I cannot generate the requested takeaways because the source material contains no quantitative data, numerical findings, or comparative metrics. The.
To produce compliant takeaways, I would need data such as: current account deficit figures, dollar reserve holdings, asset sale volumes.

Understanding Global Imbalances

IMF Staff International Monetary Fund

Date Posted:: April 7, 2026
Is Database:: Database

As of 2024, the US, China, Germany, and Japan accounted for ~2/3 of total global imbalances (the sum of the absolute value of each economy’s current account deficit and surplus). The US CA deficit is between 0.8 and 1% of world GDP.

Four economies—the US, China, Germany, and Japan—account for roughly two-thirds of global imbalances. The US deficit—equivalent to 4% of GDP as of 2024—has been financed by capital inflows and portfolio investors seeking dollar assets. Germany and Japan’s surpluses have been driven by high saving rates, joined by substantial surpluses in China beginning in the 2000s. Oil-exporting countries’ surpluses fluctuate with commodity prices, creating episodic contributions to global imbalances. In earlier decades, surpluses and deficits were more cyclical: countries moved in and out of surplus depending on business cycles, commodity shocks, and exchange rate movements. While there is no standard definition of persistence, the average duration of a deficit or surplus spell roughly doubled since the 1980s. Persistent surpluses over the past two decades have accumulated into very large net foreign asset positions for economies such as China, Germany, and Japan, with each holding net foreign assets equivalent to 3–3.5% of global GDP in 2024. Similarly, persistent deficits have built up into large net liability positions, most notably in the US where the NIIP stands at about -25% of global GDP in 2024, underscoring the central role of the US position in global balances (Figure 6).

Takeaways by Macro Roundup^® AI

Surplus durations have doubled since the 1980s, accumulating massive foreign asset positions for China, Germany, and Japan.
Understanding Global Imbalances.
Germany and Japan’s surpluses have been driven by high saving rates, joined by substantial surpluses in China beginning in the.

China’s Cheap Money Is Shaking $9.5 Trillion Global Loan Market

Bloomberg Staff Bloomberg

Date Posted:: March 5, 2026
Is Database:: Database

China’s savings glut and “monetary easing to counter slowing growth” are manifesting themselves in credit expansion overseas, as bankers seek higher yields than they can get at home amidst deflationary pressure.

Chinese banks, flush with low-cost funds, are reshaping parts of the global loan market, underscoring how deflationary pressures in the world’s second-largest economy are increasingly influencing competition with international lenders. Much like US and European manufacturers who have long complained about being undercut by cheaper Chinese rivals, bankers at global institutions now say they’re facing the financial equivalent: being priced out of some of Asia’s most sought-after borrowers as Chinese lenders extend cheaper credit across borders. Enabled by Beijing’s monetary easing to counter slowing growth, Chinese banks are expanding overseas lending amid weakening domestic credit demand. That edge may prove even more significant as the Iran crisis threatens to upend global energy markets, raising the likelihood that major central banks will hold off easing interest rates amid mounting uncertainty.

Tariffs and "International Payments Problems"

Matt Klein The Overshoot

Date Posted:: March 4, 2026
Is Database:: Database

The worsening of the US net international investment position – from -20% of US GDP in 2010, to -53% pre-pandemic, and to -89% as of the end of 2025Q3 – reflects valuation gains on US stocks relative to stocks in the rest of the world.

Foreigners are accumulating more financial claims on Americans than Americans are accumulating on foreigners across every single category: FDI, stocks, bonds, physical currency, deposits, and loans. Foreign official investors supposedly have been mild sellers of U.S. assets over the past 12 months, but the standard measure does not include state-affiliated institutions that operate on behalf of foreign governments. Meanwhile, the U.S. net international investment position has swung massively over the past few years, from -20% of U.S. GDP in 2010, to -53% of U.S. GDP on the eve of the pandemic to -89% as of the end of 2025Q3. Almost all of that reflects massive valuation gains on U.S. stocks relative to stock markets in the rest of the world. The good news is that actual U.S. indebtedness has not meaningfully increased, and the methods used to assign market values to FDI in the U.S. and abroad make the situation look more extreme than it is. (U.S. FDI assets in Ireland are overwhelmingly big tech and big pharma, for example, but the market value of those assets is imputed based on the performance of the maker of Kerrygold.) The bad news is that, if the current level of the NIIP is unsustainable, the easiest way for it to revert is for U.S. stock prices to fall dramatically.

Global trade imbalances are driven by significant surpluses in Europe & East Asia, with the U.S. absorbing much of these surpluses. A large U.S. deficit is necessary for global trade to balance. @Brad_Setser

Using annual data for 146 countries from 1985 – 2024, Gagnon and Agrawal find that a $1 increase in a country’s cyclically adjusted fiscal deficit is associated with a 22–38¢ increase in its current-account deficit, with most of the estimates ~30¢.

Related Articles:

The US net international investment position worsened by about $16tn between 2019 and 2025, driven by roughly $5.5tn in net inflows and $10tn in valuation losses, as higher rates hit a larger net liability stock, raising interest rate-sensitivity.

Is rising interest rates widening America's foreign investment income gap?

Takeaways by Macro Roundup® AI

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Noting the minimal relationship between official liabilities and the CA, Obstfeld argues that the reserve currency role of the dollar is not the cause of the trade deficit. He urges reduction in the US fiscal deficit to increase national saving.

Is the current account deficit driven by dollar demand or asset sales?

Takeaways by Macro Roundup® AI

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As of 2024, the US, China, Germany, and Japan accounted for ~2/3 of total global imbalances (the sum of the absolute value of each economy’s current account deficit and surplus). The US CA deficit is between 0.8 and 1% of world GDP.

Takeaways by Macro Roundup® AI

Related Articles:

China’s savings glut and “monetary easing to counter slowing growth” are manifesting themselves in credit expansion overseas, as bankers seek higher yields than they can get at home amidst deflationary pressure.

Related Articles:

The worsening of the US net international investment position – from -20% of US GDP in 2010, to -53% pre-pandemic, and to -89% as of the end of 2025Q3 – reflects valuation gains on US stocks relative to stocks in the rest of the world.

Related Articles:

Takeaways by Macro Roundup^® AI

Takeaways by Macro Roundup^® AI

Takeaways by Macro Roundup^® AI