Investing.com - The number of people who filed for unemployment assistance in the U.S. last week fell more-than-expected, according to data released on Thursday.
The Department of Labor said the number of individuals filing for initial jobless benefits in the week ending December 12 fell by 6,000 to 289,000 from the previous week’s revised total of 295,000. Economist had forecast an increase of 1,000.
Continuing claims fell to 2.37 million from a revised 2.52 million in the preceding week. Economists had expected continuing claims to fall to 2.43 million.
The four-week moving average was 298,750, down slightly from the previous week’s revised total of 299,500. 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 1.2281 from around 1.2292 ahead of the release of the data, while USD/JPY was at 118.88 from 118.83 earlier.
The US dollar index, which tracks the greenback against a basket of six major rivals, was close to five year highs at 89.51 from 89.43 ahead of the report.
Meanwhile, U.S. stock futures pointed to a sharply higher open. The Dow futures pointed to a gain of 1.07% at the open, the S&P 500 futures were up 1.12%, while the Nasdaq 100 futures added 1.29%.