The number of Americans filing for jobless benefits for the first time last week slipped to 217k (from an upwardly revised 220k), hovering near YTD lows and showing absolutely no signs at all of any labor market stress...

Source: Bloomberg

Oregon saw the biggest decline in claims while California and New York saw the biggest rise...

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But, for the sixth straight week, continuing jobless claims increased, rising to 1.834mm Americans - the most since early April 2023...

Source: Bloomberg

And it's going to get worse, as Goldman reminds us that ongoing seasonal distortions have increasingly weighed on the level of continuing claims over the last six months, and we now expect that the reversal of those distortions could exert a cumulative boost of 375k to the level of continuing claims between now and March.

We're gonna need more seasonal adjustments.

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