BRUSSELS (Reuters) - The euro zone's trade surplus with the rest of the world jumped year-on-year in July as exports surged 7 percent while imports increased by only 1 percent because of much cheaper imported energy, the European Union's statistics office data showed.
Eurostat said the seasonally unadjusted trade surplus of the 19 countries sharing the euro rose to 31.4 billion euros ($35.5 billion) in July from 21.2 billion a year earlier.
For the whole of the European Union of 28 countries, the unadjusted trade surplus was 12.9 billion euros in July against 1.2 billion the year before.
The main difference was imported energy -- in the first seven months of 2015, the value of imported energy such as gas and oil to the EU was 201.3 billion euros, while a year earlier, when prices were higher, the imports totalled 268.7 billion.
EU imports from Russia -- the main energy provider for Europe -- plunged 26 percent in the January-July period.
The EU's exports to Russia -- which imposed counter-sanctions on EU goods in reaction to the EU's sanctions over the war in Ukraine -- tumbled 31 percent in the same period.
