Exports grew by 17.4% in January and once again hit a historic high

The coverage rate - exports over imports - stood at 87.2% (88.4% in January 2016).

In volume terms exports grew by 16.5%, due to prices measured by Unit Value Indices growing by 0.8%, while imports increased by 11.2% due to prices rising by 7%.

The non-energy balance posted a deficit of 855 million euros (versus a deficit of 942 million in January 2016), and the energy deficit increased by 57.8%, to 2.28 billion euros (versus a deficit of 1.44 billion euros in January 2016).

In January 2017 Spanish exports outperformed the Eurozone (where exports grew by 11.7%) and the EU as a whole (up by 11.8%). Exports from Italy (13.3%), Germany (11.8%) and France (2.2%), as well as from the USA (8.7%) and Japan (1.3%), all grew to a lesser extent than Spanish exports. Conversely, sales from the UK grew to a greater extent (27.8%).

Also, in January 2017 the number of exporters increased by 2.6% compared to the same month of the previous year, and the number of regular exporters (those exporting in the reference year and in each of the three previous years) grew by 3.1%.

Economic sectors

All sectors posted export growth, with the exception of other goods. Exports of capital goods (accounting for 18.3% of the total) increased by 14.3%, the food, drink, and tobacco sector (17.9% of the total) grew by 17.9%, and the automotive sector (16.5% of the total) grew by 7.6%.

In terms of imports, all sectors also posted growth, with the exception of other goods: capital goods (19.7% of the total) grew by a year-on-year 13.2%, chemical products (14.5% of the total) increased by 7.5%, energy products (15.8% of the total) were up by 74.4%, the automotive sector (12.6% of the total) grew by 7.9%, consumer manufactures increased by 11.1%, and food, drink and tobacco were up by 17.8%.

Geographic area

Exports to the European Union (67.8% of the total) grew by 15.3% in January 2017. Sales to the Eurozone (53.3% of the total) increased by 17.2% and those to the rest of the European Union (14.5% of the total) were up by 8.9%. Of our main trade partners, sales to Italy (28.7%), France (16.6%), Germany (13.7%) and UK (2.2%) all increased.

Exports to third countries (32.2% of the total) grew by 21.9% last January, with increases in all areas: North America (20%), Latin America (12.3%), Asia excluding the Middle East (35.9%), the Middle East (13.4%), Africa (10.3%) and Oceania (13%). By countries we would highlight export growth to Canada (24.8%), the USA (19.5%), Argentina (25.6%), Brazil (15.8%), Chile (6.3%), China (52.7%), South Korea (22.1%), Hong Kong (32.5%), India (50.1%), Japan (22.8%), Saudi Arabia (8.8%), the UAE (61.4%), Morocco (24.6%), South Africa (22.3%), and Australia (8.1%).

Spain's trade surplus with the European Union grew to 1.77 billion euros in January (versus a surplus of 1.30 billion euros in January 2016). The surplus with the Eurozone grew by 1.35 billion euros (versus a surplus of 615 million euros in the same month of the previous year). Meanwhile the trade deficit with non-EU countries grew by 33% to 4.91 billion euros (versus 3.69 billion euros in January 2016).

All the autonomous regions posted export growth, except for Castile and Leon where export figures remained unchanged. The autonomous regions posting the largest increases were Asturias (62.6%), the Balearics (54.7%), and the Region of Murcia (46.4%).