U.S. initial jobless claims for the week ended 27th June came in at 1.427 million, only slightly lower than the 1.482 million seen in the prior week. Today’s figure was above consensus expectations of 1.35 million as the rate of decline in initial claims has considerably decelerated in recent weeks. The four-week moving average of claims is now 1.503 million.
In the last few weeks, the deceleration of the pace of rebound of initial claims reports has been disappointing. Having said that, the signal from claims data has become less clear and reliable given the well-known difficulties with processing backlogs and multiple filings.
Moreover, the June payroll data were pretty positive with employment rising 4.8 million and imply that although initial and continuing claims continue to be elevated, new hiring has continued to rise, thus leading net employment in the economy to rise, said Barclays in a research report.
