May 12, 2011 (The Editor’s Desk is updated each business day.)
Import and export prices increase from April 2010 to April 2011
Over the year, overall import prices advanced 11.1 percent in April 2011—the largest year-over-year increase since an 11.2-percent gain between April 2009 and April 2010. Export prices rose 9.6 percent over the past year, matching the 12-month advance in March—the largest year-over-year increase since export prices jumped 10.2 percent in July 2008.
[Chart data]
From April 2010 to April 2011, prices for import fuel rose 34.8 percent, driven by a 36.8-percent advance in petroleum prices. In contrast, natural gas prices ticked down 0.1 percent over that same period.
Prices for nonfuel imports recorded a second consecutive 12-month increase of 4.3 percent in April 2011—the largest year-over-year advances since a 4.8-percent rise for the year ended in October 2008.
Prices for agricultural exports increased 35.3 percent from April 2010 to April 2011—the largest 12-month gain since the July 2007-08 period. The increase was led by a 96.3-percent advance in corn prices and a 142.5-percent jump in cotton prices.
Nonagricultural export prices increased 6.9 percent for the year ended in April 2011—the third consecutive month where the 12-month advance was greater than 6 percent.
These data are from the BLS International Price program. Import and export price data are subject to revision. For more information, see "U.S. Import and Export Price Indexes — April 2011" (HTML) (PDF), news release USDL-11-0677.
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