The US trade balance showed a further widening in the deficit in March, to the highest level since June 2010, from $45.4B to $48.2B, while the consensus was looking for a deficit of $47.0B. The details show a strong rebound in both imports (4.9% M/M) and exports (4.6% M/M). Excluding petroleum, the trade deficit narrowed (from $19.9B to $16.9B), which indicates that the widening deficit was entirely due to rising imports of petroleum. For the GDP figures, it is an encouraging sign, as net-exports should add somewhat more to GDP compared to the first estimate. Concluding, although the trade data look weak at first sight, it is entirely due to higher energy prices and excluding this effect, the trade deficit even narrow, boding well for the Q1 GDP data.