The Commerce Department released on Thursday its "third" estimate for the U.S. gross domestic product (GDP) for the fourth quarter of 2019, which revealed the U.S. economy grew as expected in the reviewed period.

According to the estimate, the U.S. real GDP increased at an annual rate of 2.1 percent q-o-q last quarter, the same pace as in the third quarter.

Economists had expected GDP to boost by 2.1 percent.

According to the report, the gain in real GDP in the fourth quarter reflected positive contributions from personal consumption expenditures (PCE), exports, residential fixed investment, federal government spending, and state and local government spending, which were partly offset by negative contributions from private inventory investment and nonresidential fixed investment. Meanwhile, imports, which are a subtraction in the calculation of GDP, dropped.

At the same time, the real GDP growth in the fourth quarter was the same as that in the third as a downturn in imports and an acceleration in government spending were offset by a larger decline in private inventory investment and a slowdown in PCE.