8/6/09

This morning the news has pretty much consisted of Jobless Claims. Workers filing claims dropped more sharply than expected last week. Initial Claims were down and came in lower than expected. The number of people collecting long-term unemployment benefits, however, rose by 69,000 to 6.31 million in the week ended July 25th. (Continuing claims had dropped for three straight weeks.) And the four-week moving average for new claims fell 4,750 to 555,250 in the week ended August 1, which is the 6th consecutive week of dropping. After the news mortgage rates are slightly worse this morning. Not much else going on today. Tomorrow's employment report will tell the story for the week.