Jobless Claims Headed the Wrong Way

The U.S. Labor Department is out with a very disappointing weekly jobless claims report. Sadly, this is after both ADP and TrimTabs signaled a stronger payrolls base for the key unemployment and payrolls report due Friday morning.

Weekly claims were up 14,000 to 344,000, and the prior week’s figure was revised higher by 1,000 to 330,000. Dow Jones and Bloomberg both were calling for a drop to 320,000 jobless claims in the week.

The Labor Department did specify that there were no special factors impacting this week’s initial claims.

Two other readings came into play as well. The four-week moving average was 320,000, an increase of 3,000 from the previous week’s revised average. Continuing claims is reported with a one-week lag, but even this figure rose by 97,000 to 2,771,000.

Thursday jobless claims data might not be the worst reading ever, but it does not give any great positive bias compared to prior jobs reports this week regarding hopes for Friday’s unemployment and payrolls report from the Labor Department.