Jobless Claims Rise More Than Expected

Before we go any further this morning, we hope you’re sitting down for this one because it’s a shocker. OK, are you ready for it? Here it goes. This week’s report on initial jobless claims was actually a bit disappointing. While economists were expecting claims to tick up to 210K, the actual reading came in at 214K. This week’s increase represents the largest one week rise in claims since May and put the actual reading at the highest level in a month. Even with the ‘disappointing’ report this morning, this week’s claims number represents the 186th straight week where claims were at or below 300K, the 51st straight week where claims were at or below 250K (longest streak since 1970), and the 12th week where claims were at or below 225K. So even a disappointing report wasn’t all that bad in the grand scheme of things.

Although claims rose by 12K this week, the four-week moving average only rose by 250 to 206.25K, so that’s still right near the multi-decade low that was reached last week.

Finally, on a non-seasonally adjusted basis, jobless claims rose from 169.2K up to 176.7K. Even with the increase, though, it’s the lowest reading for the current week of the year since 1969 and more than 100K below the average of 282.8K for the current week of the year dating back to 2000.