I’ll keep this brief. This morning’s weekly report on initial jobless claims continues to show no danger of any imminent downturn.

The weekly number was 202,000, close to its 50-year lows last year. The 4-week average was 211,750, also close to its recent 50-year lows. Below are the monthly (blue) and moving 4-week averages (red):

The less leading but also less noisy 4 week average of continuing claims was 1.3% higher YoY, which shows weakness, but as the below 35 year graph indicates, is not near the 5% higher threshold which has typically been exceeded before recessions:

That this metric has refused to turn negative, and the stock market continues to make new highs, are the two biggest reasons why I have never gone on “recession warning” (vs. “watch”) in the past year.