Initial claims for unemployment for the week ended March 10 fell by by 4,000 to 226,000. That was in-line with projections from economists surveyed by Briefing.com. This is the 158th consecutive week that new claims for unemployment have been below 300,000. The less volatile 4-week moving average slipped by 750 to 221,500.
The major U.S. stock indexes were just about unchanged at noon New York time today–Standard & Poor’s 500 down 0.02% and the Dow Industrials up 0.25%–ahead of 24 hours or so of high headline risk. Today’s big event–maybe–is the tariff decision that President Donald Trump promised reporters this morning would be forthcoming around 3:30 p.m. this afternoon. Tomorrow’s big news is the release of the February jobs report
Positive economic data today–for the short term. But some troubling longer term trends continue. Initial claims for unemployment fell more than expected to 230,000 for the week ended January 27 versus expectations for 238,000 initial claims among economists. On the positive side as well, the ISM Manufacturing Index came in at 59.1 for January against an expected 58.5 reading
Before Washington and the government shutdown stole all the headlines, the U.S. stock market was whipping up a good deal of enthusiasm about reports of fourth quarter earnings. Because the Securities & Exchange Commission gives companies more time to file end of the year annual financial reports than run of the mill quarterly reports, earnings season for the fourth quarter is especially drawn out, but we still get some important bellwether reports this week
The U.S. economy added a net 228,000 jobs in November, the Labor Department reported this morning. Economists surveyed by Bloomberg were looking for a gain of 195,000. That kept the unemployment rate at 4.1%, the lowest since 2000. Disappointingly, however, average hourly earnings increased by just 0.2%, less than the 0.3% gain expected by economists surveyed by Briefing.com That took the year over year gain in average hourly earnings to 2.5%
Initial claims for unemployment fell by 12,000 to 260,000 for the week ended September 30. Economists survyed by Briefing.com had projected initial claims of 265,000 for the week. The initial claims total remained below the 300,000 level that economists use as a rule-of-thumb indicator for a healthy economy for the 135th straight week.
The Standard & Poor’s 500 stock index closed down 1.54% today and the NASDAQ Composite fell 1.94%. Gold picked up 0.87%. The CBOE S&P 500 Volatility Index (VIX) broke above 15 again soaring 31.94% on the day. There was just too much for the markets to cope with today. On the fundamental front U.S. initial claims for unemployment dropped again in the last week
Nothing in the weekly report on initial claims for unemployment to set the heart a twitter. But the numbers look good enough to keep the Federal Reserve on track for a 25 basis point interest rate increase at its June 14 meeting. Initial claims for the week ended May 27 increased by 13,000 to 248,000. This report kept initial claims below 300,000 for a 117th consecutive week
This morning the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that the U.S. economy added just 98,000 jobs in March. That was the weakest gain since May 2015 and way under the 180,000 jobs expected by economists surveyed by Briefing.com and the 263,000 jobs added according to the private ADP Employment Situation Report on Wednesday. But…
