Investing.com - The number of people who filed for unemployment assistance in the U.S. last week fell unexpectedly, underlining optimism over the strength of the labor market, official data showed on Thursday.
In a report, the U.S. Department of Labor said the number of individuals filing for initial jobless benefits in the week ending December 6 decreased by 3,000 to a seasonally adjusted 294,000 from the previous week’s total of 297,000.
The number of Americans applying for new jobless benefits has held below the 300,000-level for 12 out of the past 13 weeks, indicating the labor market recovery is gaining momentum.
Continuing jobless claims in the week ended November 29 rose to 2.514 million from 2.372 million in the preceding week. Analysts had expected continuing claims to fall to 2.360 million.
The four-week moving average was 299,250, an increase of 250 from the previous week’s total of 299,000. The monthly average is seen as a more accurate gauge of labor trends because it reduces volatility in the week-to-week data.
EUR/USD was trading at 1.2430 from around 1.2437 ahead of the release of the data, while GBP/USD was at 1.5683 from 1.5690 earlier, while USD/JPY was at 118.52 from 118.47 earlier.
The US dollar index, which tracks the greenback against a basket of six major rivals, was at 88.39, compared to 88.34 ahead of the report.
Meanwhile, U.S. stock futures pointed to a higher open. The Dow futures pointed to a gain of 0.25% at the open, the S&P 500 futures rose 0.35%, while the Nasdaq 100 futures tacked on 0.3%.
Elsewhere, in the commodities market, gold futures traded at $1,221.00 a troy ounce, compared to $1,224.30 ahead of the data, while crude oil traded at $60.56 a barrel from $60.60 earlier.