Today’s pre-market is filled with plenty of economic data. Being a normal Thursday morning, we see new Weekly Jobless Claims, but also Productivity and Labor Costs as well as Imports and Exports. Market futures are on the wane after pushing toward breakeven prior to these reports. Currently, the Dow is -0.6%, the S&P 500 -0.3%, the Nasdaq -0.35% and the small-cap Russell 2000 -0.85%.
As we discussed yesterday afternoon in this space, “Iran fever” looks to have broken — at least for now. Market participants are hopeful for a quick and tidy resolution to our latest military endeavor in Iran; students of modern history are likely a bit more doubtful something like this can be achieved. With pre-markets down at this hour, it appears some of this worry is being priced back in.
Jobless Claims Among the Sturdiest of Econ Prints
New Initial Jobless Claims for last week came in at a still-low 213K, 2000 claims lower than estimated and exactly in-line with the revised tally from the previous week. So far in 2026, we’ve only had a couple weeks pop up above 225K, and even that would be considered consistent with a favorable labor market.
Continuing Jobless Claims, reported a week in arrears from new claims, jumped to 1.87 million in this latest report — up from a downwardly revised 1.82 million the prior week. This is the highest level we’ve seen since the first week of the year, but again, after spending most of 2025 above 1.9 million longer-term jobless claims (which really doesn’t draw concerns until it tops 2 million, which never happened last year), we’re still officially in good shape on Continuing Claims.
Morning of Economic Prints: Q4 Productivity, Imports/Exports
The first print on Q4 Productivity is out this morning, and stronger than expected by 100 basis points (bps): +2.8%. This follows an upwardly revised Q3 to +5.2% — the highest level we’ve seen in five years, when the economy was bouncing back from the Covid pandemic. Output expanded while hours worked declined. Is this an early thumbprint of AI in the domestic economy?
Unit Labor Costs, however, were also higher than expected: +2.8% versus +2.0%. This is the highest we’ve seen since Q2 of last year, and rolls back a bit of that inclination that the AI economy is upon us. As long as we’re paying labor more to produce, generally speaking it’s a sigh of relief for domestic employment.
Import Prices for January — not delayed due to the government shutdown, just backward-looking — were lower than expected: another piece of good news for the economy. Headline +0.2% was 10 bps below expectations, ands subtracting fuel this bumps up to +0.4%. However, that’s still lower than the consensus estimate. Year over year, we’re -0.1% on Imports, the lowest print since November of last year.
Exports, which we like to see hotter than Imports, obliged: +0.6%, the strongest level since January of last year, although lower than expected year over year: +2.6%. This would be the coolest read on Export prices since July of last year, and 80 bps below the prior print.
Oil Price Watch: +2% Again Today
Finally, oil prices are up again this morning — attempting to price-in possible disruptions to the Strait of Hormuz controlled, at least as of very recently, by Iran. We’ve seen by how Iran is retaliating from the initial onslaught of bombs from the U.S. and Israel that it is targeting American stations throughout the Middle East. Closing off the Strait — which President Trump promises will not be a problem — while damaging to Iran’s economy, would likely cause oil prices to soar.
West Texas Intermediate (WTI) is currently trading at $78 per barrel (bbl), up from the low $60s just a couple weeks ago, while Brent crude comes in at $83/bbl at this hour. This will be a key metric to watch as long as this war continues, and may offer some insights into whether the U.S. is willing to engage in a long-term conflict, as we did 20 years ago in Iraq and Afghanistan.
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Initial Jobless Claims Come in Per Expectations
Today’s pre-market is filled with plenty of economic data. Being a normal Thursday morning, we see new Weekly Jobless Claims, but also Productivity and Labor Costs as well as Imports and Exports. Market futures are on the wane after pushing toward breakeven prior to these reports. Currently, the Dow is -0.6%, the S&P 500 -0.3%, the Nasdaq -0.35% and the small-cap Russell 2000 -0.85%.
As we discussed yesterday afternoon in this space, “Iran fever” looks to have broken — at least for now. Market participants are hopeful for a quick and tidy resolution to our latest military endeavor in Iran; students of modern history are likely a bit more doubtful something like this can be achieved. With pre-markets down at this hour, it appears some of this worry is being priced back in.
Jobless Claims Among the Sturdiest of Econ Prints
New Initial Jobless Claims for last week came in at a still-low 213K, 2000 claims lower than estimated and exactly in-line with the revised tally from the previous week. So far in 2026, we’ve only had a couple weeks pop up above 225K, and even that would be considered consistent with a favorable labor market.
Continuing Jobless Claims, reported a week in arrears from new claims, jumped to 1.87 million in this latest report — up from a downwardly revised 1.82 million the prior week. This is the highest level we’ve seen since the first week of the year, but again, after spending most of 2025 above 1.9 million longer-term jobless claims (which really doesn’t draw concerns until it tops 2 million, which never happened last year), we’re still officially in good shape on Continuing Claims.
Morning of Economic Prints: Q4 Productivity, Imports/Exports
The first print on Q4 Productivity is out this morning, and stronger than expected by 100 basis points (bps): +2.8%. This follows an upwardly revised Q3 to +5.2% — the highest level we’ve seen in five years, when the economy was bouncing back from the Covid pandemic. Output expanded while hours worked declined. Is this an early thumbprint of AI in the domestic economy?
Unit Labor Costs, however, were also higher than expected: +2.8% versus +2.0%. This is the highest we’ve seen since Q2 of last year, and rolls back a bit of that inclination that the AI economy is upon us. As long as we’re paying labor more to produce, generally speaking it’s a sigh of relief for domestic employment.
Import Prices for January — not delayed due to the government shutdown, just backward-looking — were lower than expected: another piece of good news for the economy. Headline +0.2% was 10 bps below expectations, ands subtracting fuel this bumps up to +0.4%. However, that’s still lower than the consensus estimate. Year over year, we’re -0.1% on Imports, the lowest print since November of last year.
Exports, which we like to see hotter than Imports, obliged: +0.6%, the strongest level since January of last year, although lower than expected year over year: +2.6%. This would be the coolest read on Export prices since July of last year, and 80 bps below the prior print.
Oil Price Watch: +2% Again Today
Finally, oil prices are up again this morning — attempting to price-in possible disruptions to the Strait of Hormuz controlled, at least as of very recently, by Iran. We’ve seen by how Iran is retaliating from the initial onslaught of bombs from the U.S. and Israel that it is targeting American stations throughout the Middle East. Closing off the Strait — which President Trump promises will not be a problem — while damaging to Iran’s economy, would likely cause oil prices to soar.
West Texas Intermediate (WTI) is currently trading at $78 per barrel (bbl), up from the low $60s just a couple weeks ago, while Brent crude comes in at $83/bbl at this hour. This will be a key metric to watch as long as this war continues, and may offer some insights into whether the U.S. is willing to engage in a long-term conflict, as we did 20 years ago in Iraq and Afghanistan.