US GDP revised up to 5.9% for fourth quarter

Alexandra Frean, US Business Correspondent & , : {}

The economy of the United States stretched by 5.9 per cent in the fourth entertain of 2009, the fastest climb in 6 years, as the Commerce Department revised up an progressing guess of 5.7 per cent.

The climb was driven up by certain contributions from commercial operation investment, in areas such as program and equipment, as well as stronger register levels. However, consumer spending was less than creatively forecast.

The fourth-quarter figure compares with 2.2 per cent expansion in GDP in the third entertain of 2009, light the world"s greatest economy from retrogression after 4 buliding of contraction.

However, for the full year of 2009, GDP fell by 2.4 per cent, imprinting the greatest full-year decrease year given the 10.9 per cent available in 1946.

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The better-than-expected US total for the fourth entertain follow interpretation from the UKs Office for National Statistics display that Britain emerged from retrogression some-more strongly than formerly thought in the fourth quarter, with 0.3 per cent growth, compared with an progressing calculation of 0.1 per cent.

The US interpretation was keenly awaited after worse-than-expected US stagnation interpretation yesterday, display new jobless claims of 22,000 last week to a seasonally practiced 496,000.

The GDP total additionally coincided with new interpretation suggesting that the housing markets liberation is faltering.

The US National Association of Realtors pronounced sales of formerly assigned homes fell by some-more than expected, at a rate of 7.2 per cent in Jan to a seasonally practiced annual rate of 5.05 million, down from 5.44 million in December. Lawrence Yun, the traffic group"s arch economist, pronounced that the results, the weakest given Jun 2009, were positively not good.

Figures for new home sales, expelled progressing this week, showed that sales plunged by 11.2 per cent in January, compared with an annual rate of 309,000 in December.

Markets gave a churned greeting to the data. After descending 45 points in early trading, the Dow Jones Industrial Average rebounded, rising by 3 points to 10324 by midst morning.

The revised US GDP total show that collateral output by companies on apparatus and program is estimated to have increasing by 18.2 per cent, compared with 13.3 per cent in primary estimates.

The figure for traffic expansion was revised up to 22.4 per cent from 18.1 per cent, but imports was revised up some-more neatly to 15.3 from 10.2 per cent, pleat the grant from net outmost traffic to 0.3, from 0.5 per cent.

The rate at that inventories were run down in the fourth entertain slowed by some-more than formerly thought, contributing 3.9 commission points to GDP, compared with the prior guess of 3.4 commission points.

Although the rebuilding of inventories is on condition that a proxy progress to the economy, not all analysts design it to last.

Paul Ashworth, comparison US economist at the investigate residence Capital Economics, pronounced he approaching inventories to yield a clever progress to GDP expansion in the initial half of this year, as bonds begin to grow rather than usually cringe at a slower pace.

But that progress will blur fast in the second half. Once inventories are behind at normal levels, that"s it, he said.

He combined that, as a little of the surge in investment probably represented restrained demand, the expansion rate will probably delayed again once the reserve of projects put on hold during the retrogression is worked through.

Ian Shepherdson, arch US economist at High Frequency Economics, pronounced that overall, expansion was still really inventory-driven. Final made at home sales were up usually 1.6 per cent, after 1.7 per cent in Q3 and 2.3 per cent in Q4. Not really encouraging, he said.

They GDP total additionally coincided with new interpretation suggesting that the housing markets liberation is faltering.

The US National Association of Realtors pronounced sales of formerly assigned homes fell by some-more than approaching at a rate of 7.2 per cent in Jan to a seasonally practiced annual rate of 5.05 million, down from 5.44 million in December. Lawrence Yun, the traffic group"s arch economist, pronounced that the results, the weakest given Jun 2009, were positively not good.

Figures for new home sales, expelled progressing this week, showed that sales plunged by 11. 2 per cent in January, compared with an annual rate of 309,000 in December.

Markets gave a churned greeting to the data. After descending 45 points in early trading, the Dow Jones Industrial Average rebounded, rising by 3 points to 10324 by midst morning.