RJ and Makay

Bank of America Merrill Lynch has reduced its estimate for first-quarter GDP growth from 2.2% to 1.5% — the most pessimistic forecast on Wall Street.

Although the job market is improving, wage growth isn't keeping up with inflation, the brokerage points out, adding that recent data on construction have also been weak. Furthermore, even if there are only modest revisions to January and February data and monthly consumption grows 0.3% in March, annualized consumption will still be just 2.3% in the first quarter, Merrill says.