A better indicator of the true growth trend will be final sales to domestic purchasers, which exclude volatile inventory and trade components of GDP.Given our expectation that the composition of the data will not look favorably on domestic economic activity, nor provide a positive forward look at current-quarter activity, policymakers at the Federal Reserve will likely look past this growth report when formulating rate policy. We expect the Fed to instead focus on the slowing trend in real final sales to domestic private purchasers, less government consumption, and inventory accumulation that slowed during the final six months of 2018 to 2.6 percent from 4.3 percent, and is likely to arrive below 2 percent through the first three months of 2019.

