TEC revision 2024: A new approach for VAT groups in German TEC data – 2025 edition

The statistics Trade by Enterprise Characteristics (TEC) provide important information on the types of enterprises engaged in international trade in goods. Users can, among other aspects, obtain insights into which sectors of economic activity are most important in a country’s imports and exports and into how concentrated trade activity is among enterprises. In combining enterprise characteristics from the Statistical Business Register (SBR) with data on cross-border movements of goods from International Trade in Goods Statistics (ITGS), TEC serves as an instructive example of the benefits and challenges of Micro Data Linking (MDL). In this working paper, we introduce a new method of compiling German TEC results. The new method tackles three important challenges in compiling TEC data. First, using data from the VAT Information Exchange System (VIES) facilitates the introduction of the enterprise as the unit of analysis in German TEC data. Secondly, advances in the method of linking of ITGS and the SBR improve the share of ITGS that TEC covers. Finally, the new method improves the precision of estimations of missing trade due to non-response and firms below exemption thresholds. We show that the new method and the choice of the unit of analysis have a significant impact on TEC results.