US Economic Growth Slightly Slowed Down

The US economy demonstrated growth during the first quarter of 2018, but the results showed slightly lower than initial forecasts. According to the Commerce Department, the US gross domestic product (GDP) grew by 2.2% annual rate during the Jan-Mar quarter this year versus the preliminary outlook of 2.3%.

The decline may be associated with the sluggish inventory growth in comparison to the suggested initial estimates. The value of the recently added inventories was reduced to  $20.2 billion from $33.1 billion, which is a major downward revision to offset the profits from fixed investments such as equipment, software and structures and further expand from 4.6% to 6.5%.

Aside from that, the increase in consumer expenditure was lowered from 1.1% to 1% while exports showed figures from 4.8% to 4.2% and imports remained unchanged at 2.2$ for the quarter. Moreover, economists projected that growth will move higher as the year progresses and could even jump up to 3%.