The U.S. economic growth rate in the fourth quarter of last year (October–December) came in well below earlier expectations.
The Commerce Department said on the 13th (local time) that last year's fourth-quarter gross domestic product (GDP) growth rate was tallied at 0.7% (quarter-over-quarter, annualized, preliminary).
This is a downward revision of 0.7 percentage point from the advance estimate (1.4%) released last month. It is also far lower than the third-quarter growth rate last year (4.4%).
The U.S. GDP growth rate is released in sequence as advance, preliminary, and final after the end of a quarter. The preliminary figure is calculated by incorporating economic activity indicators that were excluded at the time of the advance estimate.
The Commerce Department said the downward revision of the fourth-quarter GDP growth rate last year reflected downward revisions to exports, consumer and government expenditure, and investment. Consumer spending and investment by corporations slowed more than initially released, and trade, which had provided a slight boost in the advance estimate, became a drag in the preliminary figure.
Also, due to the temporary federal government shutdown from Oct. 1 to Nov. 12 last year, the decline in government expenditure was larger than expected. On an annual basis, last year's GDP growth rate was tallied at 2.1%, 0.1 percentage point lower than the advance estimate.