Initial Jobless Claims Tick Higher Off Multi-Decade Lows

Initial jobless claims rose very marginally off near multi-decade lows last week (from 208k to 219k) and slightly higher than the 213k expected…

Source: Bloomberg

The state by state data is just remarkable in its flip-floppiness (yes that’s a word!!)…

Last week California saw jobless claims plunge…

This week California and New York saw claims soar…

Continuing claims continue to oscillate around 1.9 million Americans (decoupling from initial claims stronger trend)…

Source: Bloomberg

Finally, we can’t but notice this jobless claims data series seems decoupled from various other labor market realities still… such as The Conference Board’s Jobs-Plentiful/Hard-to-Get series…

Source: Bloomberg

So, strong ADP, strong jobless claims, weak JOLTS, weak Conf Board… tomorrow’s NFP is anyone’s guess still!