Current Account Balance

Current Account Balance is the difference between a country's total exports and imports of goods, services, primary income, and secondary income. It indicates whether a country is a net lender or a net borrower to the rest of the world and is a core external-accounts indicator of macroeconomic and balance-of-payments health. This Current Account Balance series is part of the Latin Macro Watch (LMW) database maintained by the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) on data.iadb.org, giving economists, policymakers, and journalists a harmonized view of external balances across Latin America and the Caribbean.

Coverage

The series spans 25 countries across Latin America and the Caribbean at annual, monthly, and quarterly frequency, covering the period 1990–2026. Values are available as % of GDP, year-to-date (YTD), on a fiscal-year (Q4–Q3 aggregation) basis, and in millions of USD. Moving averages (MA3, MA6, MA12) and month-on-month (MoM %), quarter-on-quarter (QoQ %), and year-on-year (YoY %) transformations support trend analysis.

Sources

Data are compiled from official central banks and statistical offices, including Banco Central do Brasil, Banco de Mexico (Banxico), Banco Central de Chile, Banco de la República de Colombia, and INDEC - Argentina. The IDB standardizes these national sources into a comparable cross-country dataset.

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Format	CSV
Language	en
Country	Argentina Bahamas Trinidad & Tobago Belize Costa Rica Dominican Republic Ecuador Bolivia Brazil Chile Colombia El Salvador Jamaica Mexico Nicaragua Guatemala Guyana Haiti Honduras Panama Uruguay Venezuela Barbados Paraguay Peru Suriname
Data notes	What does the Current Account Balance indicator measure? It measures the difference between a country's total exports and imports of goods, services, primary income, and secondary income, indicating whether the country is a net lender or net borrower to the rest of the world. How many countries and which frequencies and period are covered? The series covers 25 countries across Latin America and the Caribbean at annual, monthly, and quarterly frequency, over the period 1990–2026. What units and transformations are available? Values are available as % of GDP, year-to-date (YTD), on a fiscal-year (Q4–Q3 aggregation) basis, and in millions of USD. Moving averages (MA3, MA6, MA12) and MoM %, QoQ %, and YoY % transformations are also provided. Where does the data come from? Data are compiled by the IDB from official central banks and statistical offices, such as Banco Central do Brasil, Banco de Mexico (Banxico), Banco Central de Chile, Banco de la República de Colombia, and INDEC - Argentina. What is this indicator typically used for? Analysts use the current account balance to assess external sustainability, track a country's net lending or borrowing position, monitor balance-of-payments risks, and compare external positions across Latin American and Caribbean economies. How do I cite this indicator? Cite it as: Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), Latin Macro Watch — "Current Account Balance". data.iadb.org/dataset/latin-macro-watch-dataset.