subject: Weak Stock Opening And Jobless Claims [print this page] Stocks in the country were expected to open low this week, as investors considered the latest FedEx results, as well as the weekly information on people who filed for unemployment benefits for the first time. The industrial Dow Jones average and Nasdaq futures were also weak shortly before the opening. These futures calculate present index values versus forecasted performance.
University of Maryland economist Peter Morici says that the remnants of economic skepticism have resulted in the country bearing the brunt of the effects of yen intervention. He was referring to the move of the Japanese government to boost the yen by buying up, so as to dampen deflation.
The said purchase of yen also jumpstarted the dollar and helped boost stocks in the final session. Also, stocks ended high on Wednesday because of a last-hour trading surge that tracked dollar gains after Japan's move to strengthen the yen.
The aforementioned jobless claims, the Labor Department reported, were lower than the projected figures, which caused futures to bounce back slightly. The report also says that approximately 450,000 citizens filed for unemployment benefits for the first time in the week of September 11, showing a decrease of 3,000 from the numbers for the preceding week. Economists previously calculated the number of first-time unemployment filers at 460,000 for that week.
Initial claims had limited fluctuations since last November, prompting economists to say that current conditions are no cause for celebration, at least until the figure of weekly claims drops below 400,000.
Lastly, the government's latest inflation reading went beyond expectations, with the Producer Price Index rising 0.4% for the month of August, an improvement over the 0.2% growth the month before. Economists only forecasted a 0.3% PPI rise for August because of consensus estimates. Taking out the volatile prices of food and energy, the month's rise in core PPI was pegged at 0.1%.
