Current account

In economics, a country's current account is one of the two components of its balance of payments, the other being the capital account (sometimes called the financial account). The current account consists of the balance of trade, net primary income or factor income (earnings on foreign investments minus payments made to foreign investors) and net cash transfers, that have taken place over a given period of time. The current account balance is one of two major measures of a country's foreign trade (the other being the net capital outflow). A current account surplus indicates that the value of a country's net foreign assets (i.e. assets less liabilities) grew over the period in question, and a current account deficit indicates that it shrank. Both government and private payments are included in the calculation. It is called the current account because goods and services are generally consumed in the current period.

Overview

A country's balance of trade is the net or difference between the country's exports of goods and services and its imports of goods and services, ignoring all financial transfers, investments and other components, over a given period of time. A country is said to have a trade surplus if its exports exceed its imports, and a trade deficit if its imports exceed its exports.

Transaction account

A transaction account or demand deposit account is a deposit account held at a bank or other financial institution which is available to the account owner "on demand" and is available for frequent and immediate access by the account owner or to others as the account owner may direct. Access may be in a variety of ways, such as cash withdrawals, use of cheques and debit by electronic transfer. In economic terms, the funds held in a transaction account are regarded as liquid funds.

Transaction accounts are generally used for the business or personal convenience of the account holder. They normally do not earn any or a high interest and the financial institution that maintains the account commonly charges account maintenance or transaction fees to the account holder.

Name

Transaction accounts are known by a variety of descriptions, including a current account (British English), chequing account or checking account when held by a bank, share draft account when held by a credit union in North America. In the United Kingdom, Hong Kong, India and a number of other countries, they are commonly called current or cheque accounts. Because money is available on demand they are also sometimes known as a demand accounts or demand deposit accounts. In the United States, NOW accounts operate as transaction accounts.

Current Account (BBC TV series)

Current Account was a BBC Television current affairs series of the 1970s and 80s shown in Scotland. Among its various presenters were Donald MacCormick, George Reid and Kenneth Roy. Transmitted weekly on a Thursday at 20.30 it consisted of a one subject filmed or studio report. Its editor was Matthew Spicer.

During the run up to the 1979 Scottish devolution referendum it had a sister programme dealing only with politics called Public Account.

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