Investing.com - The number of people who filed for unemployment assistance in the U.S. last week fell back toward the lowest level since 1973, boosting optimism over the health 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 January 14 fell by 15,000 to a seasonally adjusted 234,000 from the previous week’s total of 249,000. Analysts expected jobless claims to rise by 5,000 to 254,000 last week.
The four-week moving average was 246,750, down 10,250 from the previous week. The monthly average is seen as a more accurate gauge of labor trends because it reduces volatility in the week-to-week data.
Continuing jobless claims in the week ended January 7 fell to 2.046 million from 2.093 million in the preceding week. Analysts had expected continuing claims to inch down to 2.073 million.
EUR/USD was trading at 1.0663 from around 1.0669 ahead of the release of the data, GBP/USD was at 1.2313 from 1.2324 earlier, while USD/JPY was at 114.83 from 114.67 earlier.
The US dollar index, which tracks the greenback against a basket of six major rivals, was at 101.10, compared to 101.04 ahead of the report.
Meanwhile, U.S. stock futures pointed to a slightly lower open. The blue-chip Dow futures dipped 21 points, or 0.1%, the S&P 500 futures shed 2 points, or 0.1%, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 futures decreased 4 points, or less than 0.1%.
Elsewhere, in the commodities market, gold futures traded at $1,202.75 a troy ounce, compared to $1,204.85 ahead of the data, while crude oil traded at $51.52 a barrel from $51.58 earlier.