出口旺 德国经常帐盈余再夺冠

choi

德国之声, Jan 17, 2018
www.dw.com/zh/出口旺-德国经常帐盈余再夺冠/a-42182933?&zhongwen=simp

, which is based on

Rene Wagner, Germany Trumps Asia with World's Largest Current Account Surplus. Reuters, Jan 16, 2018.
https://www.reuters.com/article/ ... rplus-idUSKBN1F50WP

Quote:

(a) "BERLIN (Reuters) - Germany's current account surplus was the world's largest in 2017, the Munich-based Ifo economic institute said on Tuesday, unveiling a record high reading [for Germany: 'world’s fourth largest economy' (after US, China, Japan -- in that order]] * * *

(b) "Ifo said the German current account surplus -- which measures the flow of goods, services and investments -- was the world’s largest for the second year running in 2017 at $287 billion, followed by Japan with $203 billion.

(c) "Ifo said China slipped to third place last year with a surplus of $135 billion, less than half Germany‘s.

"The German current account surplus fell to 7.8 percent of total output in 2017 from 8.3 percent in the previous year.

Note:
(a) Ifo Institute for Economic Research
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ifo_Institute_for_Economic_Research
(section 4 History: "The Ifo Institute was founded in 1949 as the Informations- und Forschungsstelle (Ifo – Information and Research branch) für Wirtschaftsbeobachtung (for economic monitoring) with funds from the Bavarian Ministry of the Interior")
(i) There is a hyphen in its 1949 founding name in German. The hyphen is not a typo, because the German version of Wikipedia also has the hyphen:
ifo Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung
https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ifo_Institut_für_Wirtschaftsforschung
(section 4 Geschichte: "Das ifo Institut wurde im Jahr 1949 als Informations- und Forschungsstelle (Ifo) für Wirtschaftsbeobachtung mit Mitteln des Bayerischen Innenministeriums gegründet)
(ii) I fail to find the press release or report at the Ifo Website. There is reason to believe that Ifo withholds it as trade secret, available to paying clients. Its previous release "Germany to Have the Highest Surplus Worldwide Also in 2017" dated Sept 8, 2017.is in its website and was reported in news media (Financial Times and Reuters).
http://www.cesifo-group.de/ifoHo ... _Rohstoffpreis.html
(iii) German-English dictionary:
* Information *houn feminine; plural Informationen): "information"
https://dict.tu-chemnitz.de/ding ... ation&iservice=
   ^ Compound Words (Komposita). Department of German Studies, Dartmouth University, undated
      http://www.dartmouth.edu/~deutsc ... dung/Komposita.html
      ("the two parts of the compound may [or may not] also have a connecting element (die Fuge) that can have various forms [including -s-] * * * Hyphens are also used when a series of compounds share a 'primary word.' Thus in the advertisement on the right, for cold medicine, 'Halsschmerzen,' 'Kopfschmerzen,' and 'Gliederschmerzen' are compressed to 'Hals-, Kopf- und Gliederschmerzen' ")
   ^ Here the hyphen means both Information and Forschung shares the same primary word Stelle (center).
* The compound noun feminine "Forschungsstelle" means "research center."
   ^ Forschung (noun feminine; plural Forschungen): "research"
      https://dict.tu-chemnitz.de/ding ... chung&iservice=
   ^ Stelle is a noun feminine defined as "position, place."  (The German noun feminine Kostenstelle is “cost center.”
      https://www.investopedia.com/terms/c/cost-center.asp

choi

(b) current account
(i)
(A) current account (n): "British An account at a bank or building society from which money may be withdrawn without notice, typically an active account catering for frequent deposits and withdrawals by cheque. North American term checking account"
https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/current_account
(B) Google ("current account" oed) -- the latter stands for Oxford English Dictionary -- and you will see, in the first page of search return, that current means "happening now," followed by the definition of "current account [same as above]."
(C) Here is a British article about current account (checking account):
Rosie Murray -West, A 300-Year History of British Banking and the Rise of Current Accounts. Guardian, Sept 12, 2013
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finan ... rrent-accounts.html
("At the beginning of the millennium, nearly a quarter of low–income households didn't have a current account, but that is down to just 4pc ["per cent" in British English and "percent" in American English]] today")
(ii) current account
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Current_account#Overview
("In economics, a country's current account is one of the two components of its balance of payments [BoP], the other being the capital account (sometimes called the financial account) [which is a country's foreign direct investment itself, excluding the income generated from it].The current account consists of the balance of trade [of both goods and service], net primary income or factor income (earnings on foreign investments minus payments made to foreign investors) and net cash transfers [such as foreign aid], that have taken place over a given period of time. * * * "A current account surplus indicates that the value of a country's net foreign assets (ie assets less liabilities) grew over the period in question")

choi

(c) China's dwindling current account surplus as a ratio of gross domestic product (GDP) has been noticed.
(i)
(A) The Incredible Shrinking Surplus. The Economist, Sept 3, 2009

There is  no need to read it: I brought this article to your attention. Moreover, the next offers a more up-to-date graph (up to December 2016),  , which is the most up-to-date that I can find. World Bank also has a graph for each country, up to and including 2015).
(B) Brad W Setser, China's Confusing Trade and Current Account Numbers. Council on Foreign Relations, Apr 4, 2017 (blog).
https://www.cfr.org/blog/chinas- ... ent-account-numbers
* One may blame tourists' largesse (labeled "Travel Balance" in the graph) for the recent nosedive.
* Note the graph plotted with current account, which had 2015 value about ⅔ higher than that of 2007 (the previous peak). But see next.
* The corresponding graph for US (Jan 1, 1947- July 1, 2017) is as follows.

Balance on Current Account, NIPA's (NETFI). Federal Reserve Bank of St Louis, undated
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/NETFI
(ii) current account surplus as a ratio of gross domestic product (GDP):
Current Account Balance (% of GDP). World Bank, undated
https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/BN.CAB.XOKA.GD.ZS

Click "China" and the 1982-2016 graph will appear. In 2015, the ratio was merely 2.75%, compared with 9.94% in 2007.

(d) At last, I wish to point out a grammatical error. The report states, "Holger Bingmann, president of Germany’s BGA trade association, told Reuters * * * 'It is important that we as Germany also commit ourselves to promote imports.' "

It should be 'promoting."  I do not know whether the speaker, not a native English speaker, makes the mistake -- or the reporter, whose last name is Germanic in origin.