June 22 (Portal) – The number of people filing for state unemployment benefits for the first time held steady at a 20-month high last week and remained elevated for a third straight week, in an early sign of a slowdown in the labor market could amid the Federal Reserve’s aggressive credit tightening.
Data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics on Thursday showed a seasonally adjusted 264,000 new jobless claims were filed in the week ended June 17, unchanged from the previous week’s revised reading, marking the highest level of initial claims since October 2021 .
The average expectation of economists polled by Portal was 260,000 new applications.
Meanwhile, the total number of people continuing to receive benefits beyond the first week fell to 1.759 million in the week ended June 10, compared to a revised 1.772 million the week before. The latest figure was compared to an average estimate by economists of 1.782 million so-called continuing claims.
The government also reported that the US current account deficit — the broadest measure of the flow of goods, services and investment into and out of the country — widened slightly in the first three months of 2023, recovering from three-quarters of the narrowing .
According to the Department of Commerce, the current account gap widened to $219.3 billion in the first quarter, compared with a revised $216.2 billion in the fourth quarter of 2022. Economists predicted a widening to $217.5 billion in a Portal poll. dollars estimated.
Reporting by Dan Burns; Edited by Chizu Nomiyama
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