US: Weekly Initial Jobless Claims decline to 204K vs. 225K expected

• Initial Jobless Claims in the US decreased by 19,000 in the last week of 2022.
• US Dollar Index extends daily rally beyond 104.50 after the data.

There were 204,000 initial jobless claims in the week ending December 31, the weekly data published by the US Department of Labor (DOL) showed on Thursday. This print followed the previous week's print of 223,000 and came in better than the market expectation of 225,000.

Further details of the publication revealed that the advance seasonally adjusted insured unemployment rate was 1.2% and the 4-week moving average was 213,750, a decrease of 6,750 from the previous week's revised average.

"The advance number for seasonally adjusted insured unemployment during the week ending December 24 was 1,694,000, a decrease of 24,000 from the previous week's revised level," the DOL noted.

Market reaction

The US Dollar Index gathered bullish momentum after this data and was last seen rising 0.5% on the day at 104.76.