U.S. jobless insurance claims
Tension on Several Fronts but Market Moves Muted Overnight
January 14, 2021
President Trump has been impeached by the House of Representatives for the second time in 13 months. The Senate trial will commence soon after he leaves office. New Covid cases and deaths remain highly elevated in many countries. The British daily death toll set a record yesterday. Bank of Japan Governor Kuroda said monetary stimulus […] More
The Cavalry Isn’t Coming… Investors Are on Their Own
October 15, 2020
U.S. Treasury Secretary Mnuchin concedes that a fiscal stimulus deal before the election isn’t going to get done, and there’s little reason to expect the dynamics to shift after November 3rd. Central bankers, whose policies are hitting diminishing returns, have been pleading for more forceful fiscal support. The Dallas Fed President said displaced workers will […] More
The Debate, Central Bank News, and More Data to Digest
October 8, 2020
Any reaction to the single U.S. vice presidential debate last night has already been squashed by just-breaking news regarding the second presidential debate scheduled for October 15th in Miami. The debate commission decided that debate should be held virtually rather than in person inasmuch as President Trump and many of his advisers have Covid, and […] More
Equities Fall Even as Central Banks Commit to Maintaining Low Interest Rates
September 17, 2020
Share prices in Asia closed down 1.6% in Hong Kong, 1.2% in South Korea, 0.8% in Taiwan and India, 0.7% in Japan and 0.4% in China and Indonesia. Equities in Europe so far today have dropped 1.2% in Italy, 0.9% in France, 0.8% in Germany and Spain, and 0.5% in the U.K.. The dollar recovered […] More
Continuing Dichotomy Between Equities and Covid Spread
July 23, 2020
In the past 24 hours, the number of identified Covid-19 infections soared by 284,408 worldwide and 10,738 in the United States, and the number of associated deaths totaled 72,575 and 1,234. All four changes were greater than in the previous 24-hour period. Japanese markets are closed today and tomorrow for Marine Day and Sports Day, […] More
More Concern than Hope in Thursday’s Marketplace
June 18, 2020
It’s been a busy day for central bank watchers, as monetary policy was reviewed in the U.K., Norway, Switzerland, Brazil, Taiwan, and Indonesia. Released statements and some new data adhere to the baseline view that economic activity contracted even more sharply in the second quarter than the first but that the rate of slide began […] More
Dollar Extends Rise Amid Pandemic-Related Uncertainty
April 16, 2020
Overnight dollar gains prior to today’s report on U.S. new jobless insurance claims range from 1.0% versus the peso, 0.5% against sterling, 0.4% relative to the Australian dollar, 0.3% versus the euro and kiwi, 0.2% against the Swiss franc, and 0.1% relative to the yen, yuan, and loonie. In futures trading, the 10-year U.S. Treasury […] More
Brief Comment on U.S. Jobless Insurance Claims and Trade Deficit
April 2, 2020
New weekly jobless insurance claims, which are a proxy for layoffs, shot up by a much greater-than-forecast 6.648 million workers. This was the second big overshoot in a row, yielding a 2-week total of 9.955 million. The weekly average of new claims in the first two months of 2020 had been 212-3/8K, by comparison. As […] More
Shocking Leap in U.S. Jobless Insurance Claims Steals the Spotlight
March 26, 2020
From the outset of this week, the most feared data release was today’s report on new jobless insurance claims for the week ending March 21, which was going to capture the impact of broad business lockdowns to combat the spreading Covid-19 pandemic. New claims had averaged 251k during the four weeks through March 14, and […] More
Many Markets Still Closed
December 26, 2019
Extended Christmas holidays known in many countries as Boxing Day have kept market action to a minimum. The United States is an exception. U.S. share prices opened modestly higher. Share prices rose 0.9% in China, 0.6% in Japan, 0.4% in South Korea and Turkey but fell 0.7% in India. The dollar rose overnight by 0.4% […] More
