The state Forecast Council’s monthly Economic and Revenue Update (available here), which was released this afternoon, contains a bit of good news on revenue collections over the last month. Here is the summary:

• The preliminary February forecast for the U.S. economy is similar to the November forecast, with continued concerns about downside risks.
• Washington’s economy is narrowly outperforming the national economy thanks to aerospace, software, and exports; but the recovery remains unusually slow and the risks remain unusually high.
• Major General Fund-State revenue collections for the January 11 – February 10, 2012 collection period were $54.0 million (4.4%) higher than the November forecast, but almost half of the positive variance was due to legislation passed in December that increased transfers of unclaimed property into the General Fund.
• Cumulatively, collections since the November forecast are $44.8 million (1.1%) higher than forecasted. Without the extra unclaimed property revenue, and $17.5 million in unexpected one-time refunds that occurred over the past two months, cumulative collections would have been $37.5 million (1.0%) above the forecast.

This report on collections is the final input for the revised state revenue forecast, which will be presented at 10 AM Thursday morning. The preliminary February economic forecast for the state (available here) is little changed from the November economic forecast. All in all, I don’t expect Thursday’s revenue forecast revisions to be large.