WASHINGTON, Aug. 5 (Xinhua) -- The U.S. trade deficit widened by 6.7 percent to a record high of 75.7 billion U.S. dollars in June as the gain in imports outpaced exports, the U.S. Commerce Department reported on Thursday.
U.S. exports rose by 0.6 percent to 207.7 billion dollars in June while imports increased by 2.1 percent to 283.4 billion dollars, according to the department.
"Today's report came in largely as the Q2 GDP (gross domestic product) data last week suggested. With imports outpacing exports for the quarter, net exports subtracted 0.4 percentage points from Q2 headline real GDP growth," Jay Bryson and Shannon Seery, economists at Wells Fargo Securities, said Thursday in an analysis.
"The trade deficit likely will remain elevated in coming months due to continued strength in U.S. domestic demand," they said, adding trade could be another drag on U.S. economic growth in the third quarter of the year.
However, "it remains to be seen how trade evolves from here due to the rise in the Delta variant in the United States and the severe transportation bottlenecks the sector continues to face," they noted.
The U.S. economy grew at an annual rate of 6.5 percent in the second quarter, lower than economists' expectation for 8.4 percent, according to the Commerce Department.
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