Jobless Claims: Lower Again

Bottom Line: Claims moved a touch lower for the second week, coming in below expectations. Still, the medium-term averages are in a slight uptrend after bottoming in March. The shift in trend is a concern and bears close watching going forward, but so far data suggest the labor market is cooling only very slowly.Our Nowcast model confirmed the trend shift since March but continues to run below the reported level of claims. The current week is running notably lower than last week.Initial Jobless Claims FELL 2k in the week ended August 13th to 250k, ABOVE the 4-week average of 246.75k, ABOVE the 13-week average of 236k but 155k BELOW the year-ago level. Claims for the 6th of Aug were revised down from +262k to +252k. Non-seasonally adjusted Claims FELL 4.536k.Continuing Claims ROSE 7k in the week ended August 6th to 1.437M, ABOVE the 4-week average of 1.413M, ABOVE the 13-week average of 1.358769M but 1.402M BELOW the year-ago level. Continuing Claims for the 30th of Jul were revised up from +1.428M to +1.43M.