U.S. White House Stars and Stripes [AP=Yonhap News]

The U.S. economy recovered to a robust growth rate of 2% in the first quarter of this year.

A significant increase in investment, primarily in the artificial intelligence (AI) industry, offset the slowdown in consumption growth.

The U.S. Department of Commerce announced on the 30th (local time) that the advance estimate for the U.S. Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth rate in the first quarter was 2.0% (seasonally adjusted annual rate).

This fell short of the 2.2% forecast by economists surveyed by Dow Jones.

Previously, U.S. economic growth slowed to 0.5% in the fourth quarter of last year, affected by slowing consumer spending and a federal government shutdown.

The first-quarter growth calculation period also partially reflected the period after the start of the U.S.-Iran war on February 28th.

Unlike South Korea, the United States publishes GDP statistics by converting the growth rate (seasonally adjusted) from the previous quarter into an annual growth rate.

U.S. Quarterly Growth Rate Trend [Data=U.S. Department of Commerce]

Personal consumption, the backbone of the U.S. economy, rose by 1.6%, a slowdown compared to the 1.9% increase in the fourth quarter of last year.

The contribution of personal consumption to overall growth decreased from 2.34 percentage points in the third quarter of last year and 1.30 percentage points in the fourth quarter to 1.08 percentage points in the first quarter of this year.

In contrast, private investment surged by 8.7%, offsetting the slowdown in consumption growth and driving overall growth.

Specifically, non-residential investment increased by 10.4%, with higher growth in equipment investment (17.2%) and intellectual property products investment (13.0%) among subcategories.

Private investment contributed 1.48 percentage points to overall growth, with investment in information processing equipment (0.83 percentage points) making a significant contribution.

This suggests that investments related to the AI industry, such as data center construction and server equipment deployment, contributed to the expansion of overall private investment.

First Quarter Growth Contribution by Item (% point) [Data=U.S. Department of Commerce]

Net exports, the difference between exports and imports, reduced the first-quarter growth rate by 1.30 percentage points. This was influenced by a 12.9% increase in exports during the first quarter, while imports, a factor that reduces growth, surged by 21.4%.

Government spending increased by 4.4%, contributing 0.73 percentage points to the first-quarter growth rate. The U.S. federal government shutdown at the end of last year had caused government spending to reduce the growth rate by nearly 1 percentage point in the fourth quarter of last year.

The growth rate of private spending (final sales to domestic private purchasers), which reflects the underlying trend of U.S. economic demand, stood at 2.5%.

This indicates that the fundamental strength of the U.S. economy continues to show a robust trend.

Joseph Brusuelas, chief economist at RSM, told The Wall Street Journal (WSJ), "What we're seeing now is AI-led GDP growth. Growth may weaken in the coming quarters due to the Iran war."