Economic publications of the day: unemployment and industrial production in the USA

Thursday turned out to be quite rich in macro statistics output in the United States. According to the US Department of Labor, the number of applications for unemployment benefits in the US unexpectedly decreased.

In particular, the number of Americans who applied for unemployment benefits for the first time last week decreased by 20 thousand to 211 thousand people. A week earlier, this figure was 231 thousand. Analysts predicted that the indicator would rise to 232 thousand. 

The average number of applications over the past four weeks (a less volatile indicator) decreased by 3 thousand and amounted to 227.25 thousand. The number of Americans continuing to receive unemployment benefits increased by 1 thousand to 1.671 million compared to the revised 1.670 million in the previous week. 

In addition to these data, the Federal Reserve System presented statistics on industrial production. Thus, the volume of production in November decreased by 0.2% compared to the previous month. Analysts on average predicted an increase of 0.1%. In annual terms, industrial production increased by 2.5%.

In October, the indicator decreased by 0.1% month-on-month and increased by 3.3% year-on-year.

In particular, production in the processing industry fell by 0.6% compared to October, while experts expected a decrease of only 0.1%. In annual terms, output in the processing industry increased by 1.2% after rising by 2.4% in October.