US economic growth crept ahead at its softest pace in more than eight years during the second quarter, according to a US government report that showed businesses were aggressively cutting inventories and cutting investment spending during the spring.
Second-quarter gross domestic product (GDP), which gauges total economic output within US borders, grew at a slim revised annual rate of 0.2 per cent - the weakest quarterly advance since the first three months of 1993 when GDP shrank 0.1 per cent.
While that was down from a previously reported 0.7 per cent rate of second-quarter growth and trailed the first quarter's 1.3 per cent, it beat Wall Street economists' forecasts for a flat April-June quarter that could have sparked fears the US economy was teetering on the edge of recession.