Portugal’s trade balance deficit in goods reached 2.805 billion euros, marking an increase of 77 million euros compared to October 2024. The National Institute of Statistics reported that in October 2025, fuels and lubricants accounted for 14% of the trade goods deficit.
Excluding fuels and lubricants, the trade deficit was 2.413 billion euros, a deterioration of 365 million euros compared to the same period last year.
Prices continued to fall in October, with a decrease of 1.4% in the unit value indices for exports and a decrease of 1.8% for imports (-1.3% and -2.2%, respectively, in September 2025).
In exports, the statistics office highlighted the decline in transactions of fuels and lubricants (-42.5%), reflecting a decrease in volume of exports in this category (-37.6%), accompanied by a price reduction (-7.8%), an outcome not unrelated to the shutdown of national refinery units.
There was also a decrease in exports of industrial supplies (-7.3%), due to the significant quantity of chemicals exported to the United States in the previous period, mainly involving contract work transactions (without transfer of ownership).
When reviewing major partner countries of 2024, the decline in the United States (-42.6%) was most notable, primarily in the industrial supplies category.
On a cumulative basis through October, exports increased by 1.0% year-on-year (+2.9% in the same period of 2024).
In imports, the most significant drop was also in fuels and lubricants (-42.4%), primarily due to crude petroleum oil from Brazil, reflecting a 48.0% volume decline in this category, despite a price increase of 10.8%.
Among major partner countries, imports from Brazil fell by 87.9%, while purchases from China increased by 29.8%, mainly fuels, lubricants, and industrial supplies.
In the cumulative total for the year through October, imports increased by 5.5% compared to the same period last year (+1.2% in the same period of 2024).
