Continuing Jobless Claims Rise to Highest Since Mid-April

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Bloomberg Nov 9, 2023 13:53 · 12.6k Views

Continuing jobless claims increased to 1.83 million in the week ended Oct. 28, the highest since mid-April, according to Labor Department data. Initial claims ticked lower to 217,000 in the week ending Nov. 4. Mike McKee reports on "Bloomberg Surveillance."

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Transcript

  • 00:00 217,000
  • 00:01 really kind of.
  • 00:02 No change from last week
  • 00:04 waiting for the
  • 00:05 revision to come up, but basically no change in jobless claims.
  • 00:10 Here we are 220, so we go down,
  • 00:13 you know, go figure.
  • 00:14 It's not a surprise that we see
  • 00:17 claims go down with the the
  • 00:19 auto strikes over,
  • 00:21 but continuing claims still a little bit higher 1,834,000 after 1,812,000
  • 00:28 and so
  • 00:29 that may be something of a hangover from the jobless.
  • 00:32 Claims from the auto strikes as well set us
  • 00:36 up.
  • 00:36 I want to go right to next week.
  • 00:37 Mike, how is next week CPI retail sales combo
  • 00:42 in year world, not the equity world, bond world in year world, How is it different and to be treated?
  • 00:47 Well,
  • 00:48 it's a little bit different in that we have a lot more data to come before the next Fed meeting including another CPI report.
  • 00:54 So
  • 00:55 this will be
  • 00:56 informative, but it won't be dispositive.
  • 00:59 The Fed's going to look at it and they're going to wait and see what PCE does and then what the November CPI does before they have to make a decision.
  • 01:07 Not necessarily it will.
  • 01:09 It will inform.
  • 01:10 That's a good word for
  • 01:12 it.
  • 01:12 Retail sales are expected to go down
  • 01:16 for the month of October,
  • 01:18 although the control group up just a little bit.
  • 01:21 It'll depend on whether people want to
  • 01:23 go Christmas shopping early.
  • 01:25 Last year they did.
  • 01:26 This year,
  • 01:27 I guess
  • 01:28 analysts don't think they're going to be doing that.
  • 01:31 And CPI
  • 01:32 is forecast to go lower as energy prices go lower.
  • 01:36 So that would keep the Fed on track at least to the soft landing and
  • 01:40 to the idea of not raising rates again in December.
  • 01:43 What will it take, considering that we are looking at something that does look like a soft landing, but it always looks as, I'm sure you're going to say, I hear a lot of people say, like a soft landing until it isn't.
  • 01:52 Well, that's the problem is, you know, how do you define landing and when do you define landing?
  • 01:56 I was saying
  • 01:57 yesterday to Paul Sweeney on Bloomberg Radio that we should maybe look at it like
  • 02:01 George Aiken, the
  • 02:02 former Vermont senator who said
  • 02:04 of Vietnam, we just declare victory and go home
  • 02:08 and maybe that's what the Fed ends up doing at some point and just saying, OK, we're there because the economy doesn't ever land.
  • 02:14 It just keeps going.
  • 02:15 Now the
  • 02:16 question is, do we have any contractions or does the
  • 02:20 economy start to grow again?
  • 02:21 That might be the the definition.