The U.S. economy demonstrated remarkable resilience in the fourth quarter of 2025, expanding at a 1.4% annual pace despite the significant headwind of a prolonged federal government shutdown that temporarily curtailed government spending.
Even with that temporary setback, the full-year performance remained impressively strong: real GDP (Gross Domestic Product) grew at a solid 2.2% rate for all of 2025, according to the latest Bureau of Economic Analysis report. GDP serves as the key measure of overall economic health.
Looking ahead, the fundamentals point to an even more robust performance in 2026.
Jeffry Bartash for MarketWatch:
The economy could turn in an even stronger performance this year. The Federal Reserve has cut interest rates, businesses are pouring money into new technologies, unemployment is low and the effects of tariffs are expected to fade.
The increase in GDP fell well shy of Wall Street expectations. Analysts polled by The Wall Street Journal had forecast a 2.5% increase in the fourth quarter.
Most of the shortfall was tied to the record 43-day government shutdown last fall. A drop in federal spending lopped almost a full percentage point off GDP. The furlough of hundreds of thousands of workers without pay also dented consumer spending.
Absent the government shutdown, GDP likely would have come very close to Wall Street’s target.
MacDailyNews Take: As we wrote last month, “Apple and, indeed, the entire U.S. economy, are primed to roar in 2026!”
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Yeeeeehaw, the USA is gonna do it on its own.
K-shaped?