WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. economy likely grew at its fastest pace in four years in the second quarter as consumers boosted spending and farmers rushed shipments of soybeans to China to beat retaliatory trade tariffs before they took effect in early July.
FILE PHOTO - A shopper walks down an aisle in a newly opened Walmart Neighborhood Market in Chicago in this September 21, 2011 file photo. REUTERS/Jim Young/Files
Gross domestic product probably increased at a 4.1 percent annualized rate, also as business stockpiled inventory ahead of the impending import duties, according to a Reuters survey of economists. That would be strongest performance since the third quarter of 2014 and put the economy on track to achieve the Trump administration’s target of 3 percent annual growth.
Ahead of Friday’s release, President Donald Trump and members of his economic team have been promoting the notion that second-quarter growth will be robust. Earlier in the week he tweeted that the United States has “the best financial numbers on the planet.”
Along with its snapshot of second-quarter GDP growth, the report will likely include a revision of the first quarter’s growth estimate of a 2.0 percent rate as the government will also publish comprehensive revisions to prior GDP data.
“Ironically, the threat of a trade war appears to have bolstered activity in the second quarter,” said Michelle Girard, chief economist at NatWest Market in Stamford, Connecticut.
The United States slapped 25 percent duties on $34 billion worth of Chinese goods effective July 6, provoking a similar response from Beijing, which targeted soybeans and other agricultural products as well as U.S.-made cars.
Trump has also imposed tariffs on steel and aluminum imports, leading to retaliation by the United States’ main trade partners, including Canada, the European
