Initial Claims Figures Likely Statistical Noise

As a backdrop for tomorrow’s big employment report, today’s seasonally adjusted initial claims figures came in at 324K, a decrease of 5.3 percent over the prior week.  Last week’s figure was down 3.7 percent over the April 13^th initial claims count.

Seasonal initial claims data

The seasonally adjusted data can sometimes get the adjustments wrong, but it doesn’t appear to be the case this time, with the non-seasonally adjusted figures (the actual figures) coming in lower than anticipated as well (below).

The...