Investing.com - The number of people who filed for unemployment assistance in the U.S. last week rose unexpectedly, dampening optimism over the health 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 June 6 increased by 2,000 to a seasonally adjusted 279,000 from the previous week’s revised total of 277,000. Analysts had expected initial jobless claims to remain unchanged at 277,000 last week.
Continuing jobless claims in the week ended May 30 rose to 2.265 million from 2.204 million in the preceding week. Analysts had expected continuing claims to decline to 2.188 million.
The four-week moving average was 278,750, an increase of 3,750 from the previous week’s total of 275,000. 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 1.1206 from around 1.1223 ahead of the release of the data, GBP/USD was at 1.5448 from 1.5461 earlier, while USD/JPY was at 123.76 from 123.78 earlier.
The US dollar index, which tracks the greenback against a basket of six major rivals, was at 95.40, compared to 95.33 ahead of the report.
Meanwhile, U.S. stock futures pointed to a modestly higher open. The Dow futures pointed to a gain of 0.1%, the S&P 500 futures tacked on 0.1%, while the Nasdaq 100 futures advanced 0.15%.
Elsewhere, in the commodities market, gold futures traded at $1,177.50 a troy ounce, compared to $1,176.50 ahead of the data, while crude oil traded at $60.77 a barrel from $60.83 earlier.