The U.S. economy is estimated to grow at a 0.3 percent annualized rate in the first quarter, based on newly released data on domestic construction spending in December released on Monday according to the Atlanta Federal Reserve's GDPNow forecast model. The Atlanta Fed updates this as economic data is released through its website at https://www.frbatlanta.org/cqer/research/gdpnow.aspx/. If true this would mark a significant deceleration from 4Q18 real GDP at 2.6%. We had expected slower growth in 2019 as a whole so this does not come as a surprise although we had not expected it to fall as much, under 2% for all 2019 overall. To reiterate, growth may increase in 2H19 as 1Q19 markets the low point of growth for the US. Designing our model portfolios with significant exposure to Asia (specifically China) was in part due to slowing growth in the US relative to Asia. The Shanghai Index YTD is significantly outperforming the S&P (almost by 2X) in part because of the relative growth and anticipated trade resolution. At Brecken Capital Advisors we do portfolio management right because we are portfolio managers actively managing risk for our clients, potentially anticipating not reacting to economic & market events. Contact us at www.BreckenCapitalAdvisors.com on how we construct our model portfolios for clients. For more insights see our website and disclosures found there at BCA.
