$\backslash$table$[[$Net unilateral transfers,$-8,],[$Current account balance,,$-487],[$Capital and Financial Account,,,$],[$Change in U$.$S$.-$owned assets abroad,$-40,],[$Change in foreign$-$owner assets in the U$.$S$.,+42,],[$Capital and financial account balance,,$-82>],[$Statistical discrepancy,,$-30],[$Trade balance,,$0]]$

Suppose an Argentine logging company purchases American$-$made chain saws. This would be entered as a $$ item under the

$$ section of the U$.$S$.$ current account.

According to the table, the United States is running a trade $$

The current account balance suggests that U$.$S$.$ current account transactions created outpayments of foreign currencies from the United States that were $$ the inpayments of foreign currencies to the United States.

Any surplus or deficit in one account must be offset by deficits or surpluses in other balance$-$of$-$payments accounts. Because the current account is in

$,,$ the excess of foreign currency held by Americans must either be loaned to foreigners or used to buy foreign stocks or bonds. All of these transactions are then recorded in the $$ account. Since any imbalance in one account automatically leads to an equal but opposite imbalance in the other, the balance$-$of$-$payments is always $$