Wall Street was mixed on Thursday as US GDP grew at a 3.3% annualised pace last quarter, according to the government’s second estimate. It was a bump up from the 3.0% from its first estimate, and also higher than the 3.1% forecast.<\/p>\n
The return to growth comes after the US economy shrank at a 0.5% annualised pace in the first quarter, when a surge of imports dragged down GDP.<\/p>\n
The Bureau of Economic Analysis, which tracks GDP, said the Q2 bump “primarily reflected a decrease in imports, which are a subtraction in the calculation of GDP, and an increase in consumer spending.”<\/p>\n
It came as the number of Americans filing new applications for jobless benefits fell last week, coming in at 229,000 compared to 234,000 the week prior. Layoffs remained low, however, hiring also stayed tepid. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast 230,000 claims for the latest week.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, the FTSE 100 (^FTSE<\/a>) and European stocks were mixed during the session, as UK car production rose for a second successive month in July.<\/p>\n Read more: Trending tickers: Nvidia, CrowdStrike, Snowflake, Meituan and Delivery Hero<\/a><\/p>\n According to figures from the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT), some 69,127 cars were made during the month, an increase of 5.6% on the same period last year.<\/p>\n However, commercial vehicle output fell 81.1% compared with 12 months ago, which saw the highest figures for 17 years, bringing the total production number down by 10.8% year on year to 72,006.<\/p>\n Exports to the largest single national market in the US increased by 6.8% to almost 10,000 units while cars for Turkey (35.4%) and Japan (14.9%) also saw significant increases. Exports to the EU fell by 7.9% and to China by 7.1%<\/p>\n Mike Hawes, chief executive, said: \u201cIt remains a turbulent time for automotive manufacturing, with consumer confidence weak, trade flows volatile and massive investment in new technologies underway both here and abroad.<\/p>\n \u201cGiven this backdrop, another month of growing car output is good news \u2013 signalling the sector\u2019s underlying resilience in the face of intense global competition.\u201d<\/p>\n It came as separate data released by the European Automobile Manufacturers Association (ACEA) showed that Tesla (TSLA<\/a>) shipments tumbled 40% last month<\/a>. The company sold 8,837 vehicles across the European Union, the EFTA trade block and the UK in July, down from 14,769 in July 2024.<\/p>\n London\u2019s benchmark index (^FTSE<\/a>) was 0.4% down by the end of the session.<\/p>\n Germany’s DAX (^GDAXI<\/a>) was treading water and the CAC (^FCHI<\/a>) in Paris headed 0.3% into the green ahead of France’s confidence vote on 8 September.<\/p>\n The pan-European STOXX 600 (^STOXX<\/a>) was down 0.2%.<\/p>\n The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite (^IXIC<\/a>) rose 0.4%, while the S&P 500 (^GSPC<\/a>) ticked up nearly 0.2%, gaining on an all-time high set on Wednesday<\/a>. The Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI<\/a>) fell below the flat line.<\/p>\n