Brexit, gold, a growth rate of 167.7%... wait, what?!

I'm doing a research project on Australia's composition of trade at the moment, so I'm looking at Australian trading stats. Scintillating stuff.* But I stumbled on something a little weird.

 So most countries had year on year growth of 2-3%. But one country had current trading growth consistently in the double digits .... and no, it wasn't China. Even China could only manage single digits (albeit approx. 8-9%... Japan can only wish). It was something that:

• has experienced stagnation compared to its more adaptable peers
• has a fairly unpopular leader at its helm
•  whose glory days remain in the past.

Pencils down. No, it's not the Canadian band Nickelback. In fact it's the United Kindgom that is managing 25.4% YOY growth in two way trading and 71.6% YOY growth in exports with the Oz. Merchandise trade grew 167.7% - and this is all around Brexit, damn! What's in the water in the U.K? Today, the Budding Statesman investigates. (Cue boring analysis below.)

On further inspection its exports that has been driving this growth. Since exports of services actually declined, it can only be Australian goods... which is probably gold, since proportionally it occupies a larger share of total exports. So the stats suggest that for some reason Britain had an absurd hankering for gold in 2015-16.  

After patting myself on the back for discovering (what I thought) was the second coming of the Gold Rush, I dug a little deeper... and alas, it was not to be:

Britain's trade deficit with the rest of the world is L6 billion larger than previously thought -- and at a record high -- because the nation's beancounters made a mistake in their sums.

The Office for National Statistics yesterday admitted to a big "processing error" that meant it had miscalculated the value of everything that the country exports and imports for almost two years.

The problem was found in the collection of "non-monetary gold" data, which measures the amount of gold traded privately rather than used in jewellery. For every other quarter from the start of 2015, the corrected numbers improve the trade picture, suggesting that UK investors have been net sellers of gold. Since Brexit, the data shows that they have become large importers of the dollar-denominated asset in an apparent flight to safety. 

So those record growth rates were a little exaggerated, to say the least. Darn. But still, I think the Nickelback/United Kingdom comparisons are still strikingly accurate. See below: this is Nickelback's "how you remind me", with some of my own personal annotations. Remind you of any country?

And this is how you remind me

This is how you remind me

Of what I really am (a country in structural decline)

This is how you remind me

Of what I really am (a country in secular decline)

It's not like you to say sorry

I was waiting for a different story...

** I actually do enjoy it quite a bit. Although I think my economics teacher might read my blog so its in my interest to say so anyway.