Initial Jobless Claims for week ending Mar 20: -97K to 684K vs. 730K consensus, 781K prior (revised from 770K). - Job market takes a step forward - more here

   

  • Initial Jobless Claims for week ending Mar 20: -97K to 684K vs. 730K consensus, 781K prior (revised from 770K).
  • Initial PUI claims also fell by 42.5K to 241.7K.
  • Four-week moving average for week ending Mar. 20 was 736K, down 13K from the previous week's average of 749K.
  • The advance number of actual initial claims under state programs, unadjusted, totaled 656.8K, a decrease of 100.4K (or 13.3%) from the previous week.
  • Continuing jobless claims (as of Mar 13) of 3.870M is down from 4.134M and lower than 4.043M consensus. Non-SA down by 279K to 4.217M
  • Total number of continued weeks claimed for benefits in all programs for week ending Mar 6 was 18.953M, an increase of 734K from the previous week almost all coming from Pandemic Claims that continue to see huge 1M changes each week. Total UI claimants fell by around 110K. 



I will continue to report jobless claims although we continue to see huge unexplained swings in the numbers due to fraud, data errors, etc. In that regard, last week a station in my hometown (Columbus, Ohio) reported about Ohio claims

Of the more than 115,000 unemployment claims filed in Ohio during the last week, nearly 20,000 were flagged for potential fraud, NBC4 is reporting.

So color me not shocked to see a decrease of 13k in Ohio initial claims this week with expectations that it's just the start.  You can also see the data issues in the total benefits which see the total pandemic benefits recipients changing by around 1M every week.  I think in addition to the reductions in initial claims and those on benefits from the reopenings, we're also going to see a lot of reduction from improper claims being addressed (hopefully).

Moving on to the data, we're finally breaking out of the range we've been in for months as the recovery gains further traction with reopenings. Both adjusted and unadjusted claims fell by over 10% to new recovery lows. Initial pandemic claims also fell solidly.  I feel very good about what I'm seeing this week. Hopefully we'll start to see continued traction on continuing claims (which fell by high single digit percentage) and total receiving benefits (which ticked up but are two week's delayed) which remain at hugely high levels.

To see more content, including summaries of some of today's economic reports and my nightly Summary go to https://sethiassociates.blogspot.com




















Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Advanced indicators report for September - Big falloff in exports, imports up, inventories increase ex-autos - Neil's Summary

Image
US Advanced Goods Trade Balance Sep: -$96.3B (est -$88.3B; prev -$87.6B; prevR -$88.2B) US Wholesale Inventories (M/M) Sep P: 1.1% (est 1.0%; prev 1.2%) - Retail Inventories (M/M) Sep: -0.2% (est 0.2%; prev 0.1%; prevR 0.2%) Advance Economic Indicators Report - September 2021 (census.gov) Quick update on the advanced indicators report for September which summarizes first look at imports, exports, and inventories.   Exports - After increasing +0.8% m/m (all numbers m/m unless otherwise noted) on a seasonally adjusted basis in August (revised up from +0.7%) on the back of industrial supplies (+6.6%) and consumer goods (+1.6%), September exports fell by a big -4.7% as all categories other than consumer goods (+4.2%) fell, led by a reversal in last month's leader, industrial supplies (-9.9%) and capital goods (-3.6%).  Exports are up 16.8% y/y. Imports - After increasing +1.0% in August (revised up from +0.8%) led by industrial supplies (+3.6%) and consumer goods (+4.9%), imp...
Read more

Int'l - 2/24/21

Image
 Int'l Update - Date mostly from Briefing.com with some adds. Indices as of 8 am. Never thought about the fact that Japanese government is sitting on big gains in its ETF purchases. Asia Equity indices in the Asia-Pacific region ended the midweek session on a lower note outside of India which finished up strongly. Japan's Nikkei: -1.6% Hong Kong's Hang Seng: -3.0% China's Shanghai Composite: -2.0% India's Sensex: +2.1% South Korea's Kospi: -2.5% Australia's ASX All Ordinaries: -0.9%. In economic data:  - Japan's January BoJ Core CPI -0.3% yr/yr (last -0.3%) - South Korea's March Manufacturing BSI Index 83 (last 84) - Australia's Q4 Construction Work Done -0.9% qtr/qtr (expected 1.0%; last -2.6%). Q4 Wage Price Index 0.6% qtr/qtr (expected 0.3%; last 0.1%); 1.4% yr/yr (expected 1.1%; last 1.4%) - Hong Kong's Q3 GDP 0.2% qtr/qtr, as expected (last 2.8%); -3.0% yr/yr, as expected (last -3.5%) In news: Japan's Finance Minister Aso said that a...
Read more

US Univ. Of Michigan Sentiment Oct F: 71.7 (est 71.4; prev 71.4) - Final UofM consumer confidence comes in around preliminary estimates - Neil's Summar

Image
US Univ. Of Michigan Sentiment Oct F: 71.7 (est 71.4; prev 71.4) - Current Conditions: 77.7 (est 77.9; prev 77.9) - Expectations: 67.9 (est 67.2; prev 67.2) - 1-Year Inflation: 4.8% (est 4.8%; prev 4.8%) - 5-10 Year Inflation: 2.9% (prev 2.8%) Surveys of Consumers (umich.edu) University of Michigan's final estimate of October consumer sentiment came in pretty much in line with the near 9-year lows originally reported.  The overall index ticked up to 71.7 from initial estimate of 71.4 which was down from 72.8 in September.  Future expectations, which fell from 79 to 65 in August, and improved to 68.1 in September, fell back to 67.2 in the first estimate and improved just to 67.9 in the final estimate, the second-lowest reading in a decade (after August).  Current conditions, which fell from 84.5 to 78.5 in August, and improved to 80.1 in September, fell back to 77.9 in the first estimate and fell a little further to 77.7 in the final estimate, the lowest since April 2020....
Read more