Highest Ever Trade Surplus in Germany

Germany, the euro zone's biggest economy, ran up its highest-ever six-month trade surplus in the first half of 2005, thanks to booming worldwide demand for German-made goods, the federal statistics office Destatis said on Tuesday. Germany's trade surplus -- the balance between exports and imports -- amounted to 84.8 billion euros ($104 billion) in the period from January to June, Destatis calculated. That was higher than the first-half trade surplus of 84.2 billion euros recorded in the first six months of 2004 and was the highest half-year trade surplus ever recorded since statistics began to be compiled in 1950, the statisticians said. In the whole of 2004, the German trade surplus amounted to 156.1 billion euros.