Thursday, December 22, 2016

Initial jobless claims rose again in the past week, this time by 21K to 275K. This is the highest number of initial jobless claims in months. The four-week moving average, which had been in a relatively narrow range over the past several weeks, rose 6000 to 263,750 in the past week.

Jobless claims had even dipped below 250K in the recent past, but today’s number puts claims back up to the high end of the range over the past year or more. That said, this marks the 94th straight week initial jobless claims have been below 300K, a measure often associated with a positive U.S. labor market.

This all said, continuing claims fell week over week by 79K to 2.04 million. This is an historically low number. Should initial claims stay elevated as today’s read, we may see this number tick up in the coming weeks, as well.

Mark Vickery
Senior Editor

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