US: Weekly Initial Jobless Claims decline to 385K vs. 384K expected

• Weekly Initial Jobless Claims in US declined by 14,000.
• US Dollar Index continues to move sideways above 92.00.

There were 385,000 initial claims for unemployment benefits in the US during the week ending July 31, the data published by the US Department of Labor (DOL) revealed on Thursday. This reading followed the previous print of 399,000 (revised from 400,000) and came in slightly above the market expectation of 384,000.

Market reaction

This report doesn’t seem to be having a significant impact on the USD’s performance against its rivals. As of writing, the US Dollar Index was posting small daily gains at 92.23.

Additional takeaways

“The 4-week moving average was 394,000, a decrease of 250 from the previous week’s revised average.”

“The advance seasonally adjusted insured unemployment rate was 2.1% for the week ending July 24, a decrease of 0.3 percentage point from the previous week’s unrevised rate.”

“The advance number for seasonally adjusted insured unemployment during the week ending July 24 was 2,930,000, a decrease of 366,000 from the previous week’s revised level.”