Atlanta Fed cuts Q3 GDP forecast to 3.8% from 4.4% prior
The GDPNow model estimate for real GDP growth (seasonally adjusted annual rate) in the third quarter of 2018 is 3.8 percent on September 11, down from 4.4 percent on September 5. After last Friday morning’s employment report from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the nowcasts of third-quarter real consumer spending growth and third-quarter real gross private domestic investment growth decreased from 3.3 percent and 15.9 percent, respectively, to 3.0 percent and 14.0 percent, respectively. The model's estimate of the dynamic factor for August—normalized to have mean 0 and standard deviation 1 and used to forecast the yet-to-be released monthly GDP source data—declined from 1.11 to 0.41 after Friday's employment report.