Recent Updates
- Korea: GDP, Contribution to Growth in Real GDP (Q4), PPI (Dec)
- New Zealand: Performance of Service Index, Composite PMI (Dec)
- Canada: Investment in Building Construction (Nov)
- Canada Regional: Investment in Building Construction by Province (Nov)
- Croatia: Core CPI (Dec)
- Tajikistan: Monetary Aggregates (Dec)
- Macedonia: CPI (Dec)
- Turkey: Non-Domestic PPI (Dec)
- more updates...
Economy in Brief
Delay in Release
of Data for Construction, MSIO, Intl Trade, Wholesale Trade, Monthly Treasury, Retail Sales, Business Sales & Inventories, and Housing Starts Due to Lapse in Federal Government Funding.
U.K. Retail Sales Begin to Lose Momentum
U.K. retail sales fell by a sharp 1% in December...
Philadelphia Fed Manufacturing Index Rebounds; Pricing Pressure Eases
The Philadelphia Fed reported that its General Factory Sector Business Conditions Index increased to 17.0 during January...
U.S. Initial Unemployment Insurance Claims Slip
Initial claims for jobless insurance eased to 213,000 (-2.6% y/y) during the week ended January 12...
Passenger Car Registrations Hold to Low Ground in Europe
Passenger car registrations in Europe fell on a year-over-year comparison for the fourth consecutive months in December...
by Carol Stone March 8, 2007
Initial unemployment insurance claims fell 10,000 to 328,000 in the week ended March 3, basically reversing the prior week's 7,000 increase. The figure was marginally lower than Consensus expectations for a decline to 330,000 claims.
Despite the drop in the latest week, the four-week moving average of initial claims rose to 339,000, the highest since the Katrina-inflated numbers in the autumn of 2005.
In the week of Feb 24, continuing claims fell 98,000 to 2.526 million after a rise of 118,000 the week before, which likely had been storm-related. This pulled the associated rate of insured unemployment back down to its recent 1.9% average from a one-week move to 2.0%.
| Unemployment Insurance (000s) | 03/03/07 | 02/24/07 | 02/17/07 | 2006 | 2005 | 2004 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Initial Claims | 328 | 338 | 331 | 313 | 332 | 343 |
| Continuing Claims | -- | 2,526 | 2,624 | 2,459 | 2,662 | 2,924 |
