The FGV's monthly Foreign Trade indicator (ICOMEX) releases results from a set of commercial balance indicators developed within the scope of IBRE, in order to provide a broad coverage of the external sector. The historical series of indicators began in January 1998 and is available on a disaggregated basis in: agricultural products, mineral extractive products as well as products of the manufacturing industry classified by use category. The products are separated according to whether they are commodities or not commodities. For the aforementioned disaggregations the products are also classified according to their origin and destination, depending on its economic blocks.
The performance of the commercial balance is an integral part of conjunctural analyzes of the level of economic activity and the balance of payments. In the case of Brazil, which historically has reported negative balances in the services and income accounts, the result of the balance of trade has a determining role in the evolution of the balance in current transactions. At the same time, the behavior of export and import flows is an integral part of studies on the competitiveness of Brazilian products in the medium and long term outlook.
It can be observed that the first motivation for calculating the indicators was to provide information demanded by the FGV's GDP Monitor produced by IBRE and, therefore, the methodology replicates the calculation of IBGE's Quarterly National Accounts. The data on exports and imports are classified by CNAE 2.0 and the indices presented were calculated by the Fischer method.