Current account surplus for 7 months... "It will exceed this year's forecast."

The current account, the final report card for international trade, has been in the black for seven months.

According to the Bank of Korea data, the current account surplus stood at $9.3 billion in November.

However, the surplus was $480 million less than the previous month.

Although the goods account surplus, which accounts for the largest portion of the current account, increased, the service account and dividend income were largely affected by the deterioration from October.

First, commodity balance surplus of $9.75 billion,

The surplus increased by $1.63 billion compared to October, as a result of a larger decline in imports than exports.

Specifically, exports fell $2.98 billion from the previous month to a surplus of $57.1 billion.

Although semiconductors continued to increase, the number of non-IT items such as passenger cars and petroleum products decreased, leading to the overall export volume.

Imports were $47.35 billion, down $4.6 billion from October.

On top of that, the worsening travel balance has adversely affected the current account as the service balance recorded a deficit of $2.09 billion.

In addition, the primary income balance, which is the amount of money earned by Koreans overseas minus the amount earned by foreigners in Korea, was only $1.94 billion, down $1.5 billion from the previous month.

The Bank of Korea is confident it will beat this year's current account forecast of $90 billion, saying a substantial surplus is expected in December, mainly in the commodity balance.