India's export rose 2.8% in May at $71.1 billion; trade deficit narrowed
Exports of merchandise goods declined from USD 39.59 billion to USD 38.73 billion, and exports of services rose from USD 29.61 billion to USD 32.39 billion during May 2025.
India imported goods and services worth USD 77.75 billion, down from USD 78.55 billion in the same month last year.
The trade deficit in May narrowed to USD 6.62 billion from USD 9.35 billion same month last year.
So far in 2025-26, April-May, India's total exports now stood at around USD 142.43 billion, up 5.75 per cent year-on-year.
The country's imports too increased year-on-year in April-May, by 6.52 per cent as per data published today.
Overall imports, both merchandise and services combined, during April-May increased from USD 149.81 billion to USD 157.57 billion.
April-May combined trade deficit, meaning the difference between the exports and the imports -- was at USD 17.14 billion, compared with USD 15.12 billion same period of last fiscal.
India's total exports have touched an all-time high of USD 824.9 billion in the recently-concluded financial year 2024-25. This marks a yearly growth of 6.01 per cent over USD 778.1 billion exports in 2023-24, setting a new annual milestone.
The 2024-25 exports exceeded the initial anticipation of USD 800 billion.
In 2024-25, services exports continued to drive the growth momentum, reaching a historic high of USD 387.5 billion, up 13.6 per cent from USD 341.1 billion in the previous year.
In 2024-25, merchandise exports stood at USD 437.42 billion in 2024-25, with a marginal increase.
India's total trade deficit (merchandise and services) for the fiscal year 2024-25 widened to USD 94.26 billion, from USD 78.1 billion in 2023-24.
Among various steps the government took was to launch a Production Linked Incentive (PLI) scheme in varied sectors, including electronic goods, to make Indian manufacturers globally competitive, attract investments, enhance exports, integrate India into the global supply chain and reduce dependency on imports. These seemed to have reaped dividends for rising exports.
Adding an interesting layer to the market's expectations, a prediction contract with 27 active traders on the platform Probo - a popular opinion trading platform - currently assigns a 45 per cent probability to India achieving cumulative exports of USD 950 billion or more in FY 2025-26. (ANI)
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