Reuters reported on the record-setting trade deficit this morning.
The U.S. trade deficit in goods widened sharply to a record high in January amid an increase in imports as businesses continued to replenish depleted inventories.
The pace of inventory accumulation reported by the Commerce Department on Monday was, however, slower than in recent months. That, together with the surge in the goods trade deficit, prompted economists at Goldman Sachs to lower their gross domestic product growth estimate for the first quarter by 0.5 percentage point to a 1.5% annualized rate.
The economy grew at a 7.0% pace in the fourth quarter, with inventories contributing a whopping 4.90 percentage points.
“We remain on track for another strong gain in real business inventories in the first quarter, although inventories may end being fairly close to a neutral factor for GDP growth considering that the fourth quarter buildup of inventories also was substantial,” said Daniel Silver, an economist at JPMorgan in New York.
The goods trade deficit jumped 7.1% to an all-time high of $107.6 billion last month. Imports of goods increased 1.7%, led by food and motor vehicles. There were also large increases in imports of industrial supplies, capital and consumer goods. Imports of other goods, however, tumbled 15.3%.
Exports dropped 1.8%, weighed down by consumer goods, motor vehicles, food and other goods. But exports of capital goods and industrial supplies increased.
In addition, the Conservative Treehouse mentioned that inflation is expected to be worse than expected.
U.S. inflation will be even worse this year than expected, after the Federal Reserve’s primary inflation measurement hit its highest level in 40 years, according to a new report from Goldman Sachs.
The personal consumption expenditures (PCE) price index rose 6.1 percent in January from a year ago, the largest annual gain since February 1982, as seen in federal data released Friday.
via thegatewaypundit
