Goods Trade Balance: Release Dates, Results & History
Goods Trade Balance last printed -118.8B on Thu, Aug 27, 2026 against a -99.0B consensus forecast and a -102.1B prior, a -6.6 standard-deviation surprise. The next release is Thursday, September 3, 2026 at 8:30 AM ET. Captured live by Helious the moment it printed.
The advance goods balance is the first trade input into the quarter's GDP arithmetic, landing about a week before the full report. Tariff rounds have made it violent: import front-running and payback have swung the gap by tens of billions in a month, dragging GDP trackers with it. With the deficit running near $100B a month, this is where the goods side of trade policy shows up first.
The trend, at a glance
How it moves Treasuries
Direction is ambiguous for bonds, same as the full report: a wider goods gap trims GDP tracking, which leans mildly bullish Treasuries. The reaction routes through GDPNow revisions rather than the headline. See it scored live on the Helious desk, or read how the standard-deviation surprise is computed.
Recent prints, as captured by the desk
| DATE | ACTUAL | FORECAST | PRIOR | SURPRISE (SD) | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| -118.8B | -99.0B | -102.1B | -6.60 | BELOW FORECAST | |
| -101.5B | -98.0B | -106.5B | -1.17 | BELOW FORECAST | |
| $-105.9B | — | $-105.8B | -0.03 | ON THE SCREWS |
The 3 most recent prints from the desk's live capture (began July 2026), a sample. Every row links the print page published the moment the number landed; the full graded history is served by the API.
Official series history
| PERIOD | VALUE ($M) | PRIOR | CHANGE |
|---|---|---|---|
| -$102.1B | -$106.0B | +$3.9B | |
| -$106.0B | -$82.9B | -$23.1B | |
| -$82.9B | -$86.1B | +$3.2B | |
| -$86.1B | -$82.5B | -$3.6B | |
| -$82.5B | -$82.3B | -$0.3B | |
| -$82.3B | -$102.6B | +$20.4B | |
| -$102.6B | -$91.5B | -$11.1B | |
| -$91.5B | -$65.3B | -$26.2B |
The most recent official rows; the chart above draws the longer series. Desk-captured prints above include the consensus forecast and standard-deviation surprise the moment each number landed.
Monthly, ~end of month, about a week before the full trade report · 8:30 AM ET · download a sample (CSV, recent rows), free to cite with a link to this page. The full history comes through the Helious API and MCP at api.helious.io/mcp, with depth set by plan.