Investing.com - The number of people who filed for unemployment assistance in the U.S. last week fell less than expected, dampening optimism over the strength of the labor market, official data showed on Thursday.
In a report, the U.S. Department of Labor said the number of individuals filing for initial jobless benefits in the week ending January 17 decreased by 10,000 to a seasonally adjusted 307,000 from the previous week’s total of 317,000.
Analysts had expected initial jobless claims to decline by 17,000 to 300,000 last week.
Continuing jobless claims in the week ended January 10 rose to 2.443 million from 2.428 million in the preceding week. Analysts had expected continuing claims to decline to 2.410 million.
The four-week moving average was 306,500, an increase of 6,550 from the previous week’s total of 300,000. The monthly average is seen as a more accurate gauge of labor trends because it reduces volatility in the week-to-week data.
EUR/USD was trading at 1.1611 from around 1.1607 ahead of the release of the data, while GBP/USD was at 1.5187 from 1.5182 earlier, while USD/JPY was at 117.72 from 117.79 earlier.
The US dollar index, which tracks the greenback against a basket of six major rivals, was at 92.91, compared to 92.95 ahead of the report.
Meanwhile, U.S. stock futures pointed to a higher open. The Dow futures pointed to a gain of 0.45% at the open, the S&P 500 futures rose 0.45%, while the Nasdaq 100 futures tacked on 0.3%.
Elsewhere, in the commodities market, gold futures traded at $1,290.50 a troy ounce, compared to $1,288.80 ahead of the data, while crude oil traded at $48.29 a barrel from $48.49 earlier.