- Federal Reserve
The number of Americans seeking first-time unemployment benefits declined last week and remained near the lowest level in 14 years, the latest sign of strengthening labour market. Jobless claims fell by 6,000 to 289,000 in the week ended December 13, the fewest since early November, a Labor Department report showed. New applications for unemployment benefits have stayed below the 300,000 threshold in 13 of the past 14 weeks, the longest such streak since the first half of 2000. The four-week moving average, which irons out volatile weekly data, declined by 750 to 298,750. Meanwhile, companies continue to hire more workers and job creation is set for the best year since 1999. The American economy added a seasonally adjusted 321,000 new jobs in November, a separate report showed earlier this month, while the jobless rate was at 5.8%. The Fed officials now expect the jobless rate will decline to 5.2% or 5.3% in 2015, putting the unemployment rate in a zone policy makers consider "full employment".
In the meantime, the US services sector activity slowed in December, as the preliminary PMI gauge for the services industry dropped to 53.6 down from the final 56.2 a month earlier. That was the lowest reading since February, extending the drop seen since the index climbed to a cyclical peak in the low-60s in June. The sub-component measuring price growth declined to the weakest level since March last year.
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