Confidential data in Turkish trade figures
There isn’t much new in the June trade balance figures, which were released yesterday:
Imports are continuing to grow more than exports…
…while a small consolation coming from monthly export growth surpassing imports, after the usual seasonality and working-day adjustment of course…
…and VAT on imports continuing to be an inaccurate predictor of imports
But then, you notice that Turkey’s unprocessed fuel and oil imports suddenly dropped:
Could it be that the government had finally (and suddenly) been able to reduce Turkey’s dependency on energy imports? Since the thousand-year Reich is around the corner, it could as well be possible.
But the answer is much simpler: It seems that TurkStat has come up with a new series under BEC imports, called “confidential data” (I am not kidding), and most of the unprocessed fuel and oil imports seem to have been dumped into this new category.
Since TurkStat, in the usual way of doing business at Turkish government agencies, has not provided any explanation whatsoever, I have no idea what is going on. Neither do my Turkey economist friends, who noticed the new series yesterday as well. So unfortunately, I cannot tell you why this data suddenly became “confidential”.
The head of TurkStat (I am not sure if the current one) once said that statistics are their honor. Incidentally, Turks use the word “namus” to refer to “virginity” as well. So then I would say TurkStat has been raped…
Thanks to David Rogovic, Roubini Global Economics’ Turkey analyst, who has a Critical Issue piece on the trade deficit, for pointing out to the data to me. Since I don’t really go into the nitty gritty details of data anymore unless I really have to, I would have not have noticed…
2 Responses to “Confidential data in Turkish trade figures”
balyoz • August 1st, 2011 at 4:39 pm
Where did you (not) get that data from? In TCMB website, all necessary data is promptly released under "mineral yakitlar and mineral yaglar".
BTW, the unpredicatability of VAT data may be due to some government agencies not being able to pay the VAT on time.
edeliveli • August 1st, 2011 at 9:42 pm
From TurkStat; I guess the CBT is still reporting under the old system….
I am not an expert on this VAT business, but all I know is that it is never very accurate… But Turkey economists still use it, as it is the only alternative…
