U.S. weekly initial jobless claims drop to lowest since 1969, continue to indicate towards strong labor markets

U.S. weekly initial jobless claims dropped. For the week ended 19 January, jobless claims fell to 199k from 212k. This is the lowest since 1969. With this, the four-week moving average dropped to 215k. However, the headline figure includes only claims filed in regular state programs and does not include claims filed by federal employees in federal programs. Federal employee claim continued to rise and came in at 25.4k in the week ended 12 January.

“These data are received with an additional one-week lag compared with the headline number, and we expect a further rise in federal employee claims in next week’s report”, said Barclays in a research report.

However, only furloughed workers are eligible to apply for unemployment benefits and the current shutdown has fewer furloughed workers than the 2013 and 1995-96 shutdowns. Therefore, it is unlikely that federal claims will increase to levels seen in the previous shutdowns.

Meanwhile, continuing claims for the week ended 12 January dropped to 1.713 million from 1.737 million. The insured jobless rate remained stable at 1.2 percent. Overall, the headline claims data continue to indicate towards strong labor markets.

At 15:00 GMT the FxWirePro's Hourly Strength Index of US Dollar was highly bullish at -109.089 more details on FxWirePro's Currency Strength Index, visit http://www.fxwirepro.com/currencyindex