Market rallies anyway.
The FTSE was up 100 points to 4,252 in the immediate aftermath of data showing that gross domestic product in the US had been revised lower to reflect weaker consumer spending and falling overseas sales.
US GDP dropped by a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 0.5 per cent in the third quarter, compared with a pre-revision estimate of 0.3 per cent. This was the weakest performance since a 1.4 per cent decrease in the third quarter of 2001, the year of the dot.com bust.
The outlook for corporate profits going into the fourth quarter is similarly uninspiring. In Q3, profits after taxes fell 3 per cent to $1,302bn, a third consecutive quarter of declines. Year on year, profits have fallen 9.9 per cent.
Nor is there much reason to be optimistic about the consumer going into the crucial holiday season: the data revisions showed third-quarter spending by consumers dropped 3.7 per cent, versus the previously reported decline of 3.1 per cent.
Purchases of durable goods also slowed dramatically, falling 15.2 per cent during the period, a steeper decline than the previously reported fall of 14.1 per cent.