The low side of the consensus reported by Bloomberg was -6.1% annualized (which is interesting, because expectations were down to -6.5% when the preliminary report was released). The BEA report came in at -6.2%. Remember that the preliminary report estimated -3.8%, beating expectations. This is a rather significant revision. From the official report:

Real gross domestic product — the output of goods and services produced by labor and property located in the United States — decreased at an annual rate of 6.2 percent in the fourth quarter of 2008, (that is, from the third quarter to the fourth quarter), according to preliminary estimates released by the Bureau of Economic Analysis. In the third quarter, real GDP decreased 0.5 percent.

…

The decrease in real GDP in the fourth quarter primarily reflected negative contributions from exports, personal consumption expenditures, equipment and software, and residential fixed investment that were partly offset by a positive contribution from federal government spending. Imports, which are a subtraction in the calculation of GDP, decreased.

Most of the major components contributed to the much larger decrease in real GDP in the fourth quarter than in the third. The largest contributors were a downturn in exports and a much larger decrease in equipment and software. The most notable offset was a much larger decrease in imports.

…

The preliminary estimate of the fourth-quarter change in real GDP is 2.4 percentage points, or $74.4 billion, lower than the advance estimate issued last month. The downward revision to the percent change in real GDP was widespread; the largest contributors were downward revisions to private inventory investment, to exports, and to personal consumption expenditures for nondurable goods.

Make no mistake, this isn’t a good report. However, that last paragraph actually has a bit of good news. A big factor in the revision is lowered private inventory investment. Though inventory investment contributes to GDP, it’s not where you want to see big numbers in a downturn. It measures the amount of stuff that businesses bought that they weren’t able to sell. If inventories are still high, it’s difficult to have a recovery. Businesses are buying less stuff that they can’t sell. As actual inventories decline, cash flow is improved for these businesses (sometimes it’s better to have a month selling old stuff than to have a month buying stuff nobody wants). After inventories drop, or when demand picks up, businesses need to start buying again. That can still happen while things appear to be pretty bad, but it’s often a sustainable component of GDP at that point in the cycle.

Bloomberg’s take is slightly more pessimistic.