Positive Week: Encouraging for Q1 GDP Growth
· As had been widely expected, fourth quarter real GDP was revised from a slight negative to a slight positive on a better-than-initially-thought performance from business fixed investment and trade.
· In spite of the ongoing policy headwinds, the U.S. economy is experiencing better performance out of the January and early February indicators, which point to a pick-up in the pace of real GDP growth. We expect an increase in real GDP of nearly 3 percent (annualized) in the first quarter.