US strongly revises up Q2 GDP growth, inflation stable

The US Commerce Department on Wednesday revised upwards its estimate for second-quarter GDP growth in the world's largest economy, moving it up by 0.7 percentage points to 2.2 percent. "The contributors to the increase in real GDP in the second quarter were consumer spending, investment, and exports. Imports, which are a subtraction in the calculation of GDP, increased," the Bureau of Economic Analysis said in a statement. The new data will come as a boost to US President Donald Trump as his Republican Party heads into key midterm elections in November, with the state of the economy a key issue for voters. In terms of specific industries, the leading contributors to the increase were real estate, information, durable goods manufacturing, and finance and insurance, the BEA said. Decreases came from the transportation and retail trade, as well as from non-durable goods manufacturing. The BEA also revised upwards its estimate of GDP growth in the first quarter of this year by 0.4 percentage points to 2.5 percent. That change was primarily driven by upward revisions to consumer spending and services exports, the department said. In a separate release, the BEA said the US Federal Reserve's preferred inflation gauge stood at 3.4 percent year-on-year in August, unchanged from the...