The world’s biggest economy chalked up annualized growth of 5.7 percent in the fourth quarter, beating the expectations of Wall Street analysts, and marking its best performance since 2003.

However, the figures from the Commerce Department in Washington D.C. also showed that the US economy contracted 2.4 percent in 2009, its worst performance since just after World War II.

The numbers revealed a sharp slowing of the inventory cutbacks that have been forced on companies by a downturn that began in late 2007. A smaller drop in inventories alone contributed 3.4 percentage points of the growth in the quarter.

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