Courtesy of Mish.
For the first quarter, the initial GDPNow forecast was 2.3% on January 30, 2017. The GDPNow forecast spiked quickly to 3.4% then crashed to a final estimate of 0.2% on April 27.
For comparison purposes, Nowcast was at 2.9% on February 3, the closest date to the initial GDPNow forecast. The final Nowcast estimate was 2.7%.
The advance GDP estimate from the BEA was 0.7%. Thus the Nowcast was two full percentage points too high. In contrast, GDPNow was in the ballpark but 0.5 percentage points too low.
Massive Divergence Again
Using May 1 as the starting point for second-quarter estimates, GDPNow’s initial forecast is 4.3% vs Nowcast at 1.8%.
GDPNow seems wildly high, but it was in the same spot in the first quarter, predicting as much as 3.4% growth.
GDPNow Latest forecast: 4.2% — May 5, 2017
The GDPNow model forecast for real GDP growth (seasonally adjusted annual rate) in the second quarter of 2017 is 4.2 percent on May 4, down from 4.3 percent on May 1. The forecast for second-quarter real consumer spending growth declined from 3.2 percent to 3.0 percent after yesterday’s light vehicle sales release from the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis. The forecast of the contribution of inventory investment to second-quarter growth increased from 0.97 percentage points to 1.14 percentage points after this morning’s manufacturing report from the U.S. Census Bureau.
FRBNY Nowcast Latest forecast: 1.8% — May 5, 2017
