Weekly Jobless Claims Bring No Mercy

The weekly jobless claims just keep offering no real support to the labor market.  Data released by the U.S. Labor Department showed that the weekly jobless claims rose again.  The prior week’s figure of 414,000 was revised to 420,000 and the report this week was up at 429,000. Bloomberg had consensus estimates of 415,000.

The four-week average was unchanged at 426,500 and the unemployment rate for those with unemployment insurance was unchanged at 2.9%.

The army of unemployed, measured by the continuing jobless claims with a 1-week lag, fell by 1,000 to 3.697 million.

We did see a note that six states were simply estimated due to a glitch.  A glitch?  In short, next week’s revision could be a bit more off than in prior weeks.

JON C. OGG