Investors are looking for any clue and any hint that they can get about the economic expansion right now. Is there expansion, or are global Gross Domestic Product (GDP) figures starting to indicate flat to light contraction? Friday’s coming GDP report from the Bureau of Economic Analysis would be discounted any other time due to this being the second and final revision to the second quarter of 2015. What stands out here is that this time could be slightly different.
For starters, the global growth story was still better in the second quarter than it has been in the third quarter. Is it possible that investors will let a solid number, even an old one, put them in a better mood?
The report is due at 8:30 a.m. Eastern Time. Dow Jones and Bloomberg are both indicating that the consensus estimate is for second quarter GDP to be unchanged at 3.7%.
Another issue is that the Fed is looking for any sort of inflation it can find. The so-called “price index” is pegged to remain at 2.1%. As a reminder, the Federal Reserve really wants inflation up in the 2.0% area on up to 2.5%. Why this may matter is that the second quarter was also roughly the peak reporting when companies in the United States were complaining about the strength of the U.S. dollar.
Another consideration here is that the seasonal adjustment comparisons for the first quarter have been proven to be a bit off. So what happens if the revision comes in a tad better than expected and what happens if the BEA again says that the first quarter’s GDP report was not as weak as it looked even after the revisited data? Suddenly the outlook for 2015 could be less weak in growth, and that might lead some economists to increase their total 2015 U.S. GDP estimates.
The BEA said in its last report, covering the first revision to second quarter GDP:
The increase in real GDP in the second quarter reflected positive contributions from personal consumption expenditures (PCE), exports, state and local government spending, nonresidential fixed investment, residential fixed investment, and private inventory investment. Imports, which are a subtraction in the calculation of GDP, increased… The acceleration in real GDP in the second quarter reflected an upturn in exports, an acceleration in PCE, a deceleration in imports, an upturn in state and local government spending, and an acceleration in nonresidential fixed investment that were partly offset by decelerations in private inventory investment, in federal government spending, and in residential fixed investment.
Second revisions rarely matter when it comes to moving the markets around. There is a chance, particularly if the second quarter revision looks better again and if the disparity of the first quarter is talked up for the better, that this time could be at least a tad different.
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