Recent Updates
- ** New Zealand's Jobs Online Report has been delayed by the source, MBIE, until 6:00 PM ET 4/26.**
- Singapore: IP (Mar); Brunei: International Trade (Dec); Myanmar: Overseas Employment (Aug); Korea: GDP (Q1); China: Gini Coefficient (2017), Construction Output Value (Q1), Government Finance, Consumer Confidence (Mar)
- New Zealand: Tourism Expenditure (Mar)
- New Zealand: Tourism Expnediture, Foreign Currency Assets & Liabilities (Mar); Australia: Labor Force Survey (Mar),
- more updates...
Economy in Brief
Japan Shows Very Moderate Growth As Trade War Clouds Gather
Japan’s sector indexes showed a solid gain in February...
U.S. Consumer Confidence Unexpectedly Rose in April
The Conference Board Consumer Confidence Index rose to 128.7 in April from 127.0 (initially reported as 127.7) in March...
U.S. New Home Sales and Prices Strengthen
Sales of new single-family homes during March increased 4.0% (8.8% y/y) to 694,000 (SAAR)...
U.S. FHFA House Price Index Continues to Strengthen
The FHFA index of U.S. house prices rose 0.6% during February...
U.S. Energy Prices Rise Further
Retail gasoline prices increased to $2.80 per gallon last week (14.3% y/y)...
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 |
