Bessent says U.S. will finish the year with 3% GDP growth, sees 'very strong' holiday season

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said on Sunday that it's been a “very strong” holiday shopping season so far and predicted that the U.S. economy would end the year on strong footing.

“The economy has been better than we thought. We've had 4% GDP growth in a couple of quarters,” he said in an interview on CBS News' 'Face the Nation.' “We're going to finish the year, despite the Schumer shutdown, with 3% real GDP growth.”

Gross domestic product contracted by 0.6% year-over-year for the first three months of 2025, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis. The second quarter of the year saw a 3.8% increase.

Initial estimates from the BEA for the third quarter economic results are scheduled to publish on December 23. The latest estimate from the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta, on December 5, puts third-quarter annual GDP growth at 3.5%.

Consumers, whose spending accounts for nearly 70% of U.S. GDP, remain gloomy about the state of the economy. The University of Michigan's consumer sentiment survey came in at 53.3 in December, up 4.5% from November but down 28% from this time last year.