US: Weekly Initial Jobless Claims decline to 340K vs. 345K expected

• Weekly Initial Jobless Claims in US declined by 14,000.
• US Dollar Index continues to move sideways around 92.50.

There were 340,000 initial claims for unemployment benefits in the US during the week ending August 28, the data published by the US Department of Labor (DOL) revealed on Thursday. This reading followed the previous print of 354,000 (revised from 353,000) and came in slightly better than the market expectation of 345,000.

Market reaction

The US Dollar Index showed no immediate reaction to this report and was last seen posting small daily losses at 92.46.

Additional takeaways

"The 4-week moving average was 355,000, a decrease of 11,750 from the previous week's revised average."

"The advance seasonally adjusted insured unemployment rate was 2.0 percent for the week ending August 21."

"The advance number for seasonally adjusted insured unemployment during the week ending August 21 was 2,748,000, a decrease of 160,000 from the previous week's revised level."