FYI: The US got a hit of labor data this morning with the ADP employment change for the month of December and initial jobless claims coming in with contradicting results. While the ADP data saw the biggest surprise to the upside since February 2017, initial jobless claims are telling a slightly different story as it showed a sizeable miss.
Contrary to last week’s rather boring release, claims came in at 231K; well above expectations of 220K on a seasonally adjusted basis. It is also up from last week’s reading of 221K. That brings the indicator right back near highs from the latter half of November when it peaked at 235K. These upticks still do not necessarily seem to suggest a weaker labor market or that the broader trend has reversed though. While it could technically be early signs of that, more data and further upticks would be needed to confirm this. Regardless, the data alongside the strong ADP report is still showing a very strong labor market holding onto some impressive streaks. Initial jobless claims has now been at or below 250K for 65 weeks in a row. Even more impressively, this week marks the 200th week that claims have come in below 300K!
Regards,
Ted
https://www.bespokepremium.com/think-big-blog/initial-claims-contradicting-adp/
