Yesterday we reported that economists were estimating third quarter U.S. economic growth at 32 percent. The Atlanta Federal Reserve Bank has revised that upward, to 34.6 percent.
The forecast for business investment for the quarter is now seven percentage points higher than the most recent previous estimates, and personal consumption estimates are 2.6 percentage points higher, the Atlanta Fed reports.
“The GDPNow model estimate for real GDP growth (seasonally adjusted annual rate) in the third quarter of 2020 is 34.6 percent on October 1, up from 32.0 percent on September 25,” the Atlanta Fed’s GDNow page reports. “After recent releases from the Institute for Supply Management, the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, and the U.S. Census Bureau, the nowcasts of third-quarter real gross private domestic investment growth and third-quarter real personal consumption expenditures growth increased from 38.1 percent and 34.2 percent, respectively, to 45.1 percent and 36.8 percent, respectively, while the nowcast of the contribution of change in real net exports to third-quarter real GDP growth decreased from -0.28 percentage points to -0.56 percentage points.”
