External statistics revision

Published: 30/6/2021

The release of data on the balance of payments, the international investment position and external debt for the first quarter of 2021, i.e. March 2021, incorporates a somewhat larger and longer revision of data for previous quarters/months than usual. The changes in data were for the most part due to the revised reports of reporting units in the non-financial corporations sector. Other changes resulted from the need for further methodological adjustments of external statistics with international statistical standards. For example, other short-term claims/liabilities now include stocks of claims/liabilities deriving from time mismatch between the receipt and use of EU funds. In addition, the statistical treatment of part of EU funds (so-called Financial Instruments) within the balance of payments was also changed, as their characteristics at the moment correspond more to the characteristics of a debt instrument than of a capital transfer, so that this part was deducted from the part of capital transfer revenues for the 2016 to 2020 period. Finally, it should be noted that all these changes in data were made in order to further align external statistics and financial account statistics.