Rudy Thomas

Top 5 Takeaways This Week: Fourth-quarter GDP slowed sharply  to 1.4%, largely due to the government shutdown and weaker exports. Government spending contracted by 5.1% , negatively impacting overall economic growth. Exports declined 0.9%  following a strong surge in the prior quarter. Housing remains a bright spot , with building permits and new home sales near multi-year highs. Economic growth could reaccelerate  once budget issues are resolved and the federal government is fully...

This morning, we received the ADP Private Employment Report for January. Private businesses added a relatively small number of jobs during the month, totaling only 22,000. This compares to a downwardly revised 37,000 net hires in December. The healthcare sector added 74,000 workers in January, while business services declined by 57,000. Under normal circumstances, we would also have the government-sponsored Bureau of Labor Statistics employment report on Friday to compare with the ADP...

We are finally starting to see various agencies catch up from the government shutdown in October and November of last year. One of the most watched economic releases is always the quarterly GDP numbers. The final third quarter number showed growth of 4.4%, a significant jump from the 3.8% level of the second quarter of 2025. This was also the strongest growth quarter since the third quarter of 2023. The increased strength can be attributed directly to gains in consumer spending and a rebound...