Q3 growth sees best performance in 2 years at 3.5%

Washington

THE US economy grew faster than initially thought in the third quarter, notching its best performance in two years, amid solid consumer spending and a jump in soya bean exports.

Gross domestic product (GDP) increased at a 3.5 per cent annual rate instead of the previously reported 3.2 per cent pace, the Commerce Department said in its third GDP estimate on Thursday. Growth was the strongest since the third quarter of 2014 and followed the second quarter's anaemic 1.4 per cent pace.

Output was also lifted by upward revisions to business investment in structures and intellectual property products, underscoring the economy's solid fundamentals, which contributed to the Federal Reserve raising interest rates last …