On the evening of the 18th, Beijing time, the US Department of Labor reported that in the week ending April 13, the number of people applying for unemployment benefits had stabilized at 212,000 for the first time, indicating that companies are still unwilling to lay off workers.
The jobless claims data at the beginning of last week was slightly lower than the Dow Jones estimate of 215,000 people, reflecting the tight labor market even though the Federal Reserve kept the benchmark interest rate at its highest level in 23 years.
The number of people continuing to claim unemployment benefits increased by 2,000 to 1.81 million in the week ending April 6, in line with FactSet's estimates.