Jason A. Weisberg of Seaport Securities weighs in on revised first-quarter GDP and Friday's consumer spending report for April.
The U.S. economy grew at a slightly slower pace than originally reported in the first quarter. According to revisions released by the Commerce Department on Thursday, U.S. gross domestic product rose at a 2.4 percent annual pace in the first three months of the year, which was down slightly from the 2.5 percent pace originally reported last month.
However, analysts argue that the report shouldn't cause too much worry about the overall health of the U.S. economy as the government's second look at first-quarter growth showed consumer spending picked up at a 3.4 percent annual rate, the fastest spending growth in more than two years. The Commerce Department will release April's consumer spending report on Friday at 8:30 a.m. Eastern.
"I would expect the numbers to trend the same way, with an upward bias, but quite frankly, I wouldn't be surprised if we saw a number that was negative," said Weisberg. "Again, marginally negative. I just think that the trend of the numbers, we really only have one direction that we could possibly go because things were pretty bleak six months to a year ago, and I would expect that we'll see the continued trend upward," he said.
During the first-quarter, tax hikes from the expiration of the payroll tax cuts and government spending cuts from the sequestration were thought to have hit consumer's pocketbooks, affecting consumer spending.
"As far as new taxes having meaningful impact, I think that people were prepared for that before the tax change actually happened," said Weisberg. "People curtailed their spending in anticipation of the new tax cuts. That being said, I think that we're going to see more of an impact within corporate finance as opposed to personal finance, and I think they're going to be much more heavily impacted, and that will eventually trickle down to the individual consumers and tax payers," he said.
Separate data released Thursday showed that the number of Americans filing new claims for unemployment benefits unexpectedly rose last week. Initial jobless claims for state unemployment benefits increased 10,000 to a seasonally adjusted 354,000, the Labor Department said.
Other data revealed that pending home sales hit their highest level since April 2010. The National Association of Realtors said on Thursday its Pending Home Sales Index, based on contracts signed last month, rose 0.3 percent to 106.0, the highest reading since April 2010.