US GDP Growth Unrevised At 2.1% In The Second Quarter As The Economy Shows Resilience  

• The U.S. economy maintained a fairly solid pace of growth in the second quarter and activity appears to have accelerated this quarter, but a looming government shutdown and an ongoing strike by auto workers are dimming the outlook for the rest of 2023.
• Inflation also remains elevated and tight labour market conditions continue to prevail, with the number of Americans filing new claims for unemployment benefits rising slightly last week, the reports showed on Thursday.
• "The big news is not that nothing has changed, but that the economy remains resilient, inflation remains elevated and the Fed's worst-case scenario, stagflation, has been avoided for now," said Chris Zaccarelli, chief investment officer at Independent Advisor Alliance in Charlotte, North Carolina. "Given how much the Fed has raised rates, it's impressive that the economy is still growing at this pace."
• Gross domestic product increased at an unrevised 2.1% annualized rate last quarter, the government said in its third estimate of GDP for the April-June period. That was in line with economists' expectations. A downgrade in growth in consumer spending to a lacklustre 0.8% rate from the previously reported 1.7% pace was offset by a sharp upward revision to business investment in factories amid a push by the Biden administration to bring semiconductor manufacturing back to the United States.

(Source: Reuters)