Friday, April 26, 2019

Both leading components of GDP declined


 - by New Deal democrat

While overall GDP increased at a 3.2% annualized rate in the first quarter, personal consumption expenditures increased by a much more lackluster 1.2% annualized rate.

But the big news from my point of view is that private residential investment declined for the fifth quarter in a row, and proprietors’ income (a somewhat less leading proxy for corporate profits, which won’t be reported for another month) declined as well. Corporate profits had declined in Q4 of last year as well.

This means that both leading components of GDP are in confirmed declines.

Once FRED has the graphs, I will put up a more detailed analysis at Seeking Alpha and link to it here.