Tom Hopkins on US weekly initial jobless claims

Date: 20 Jan 2023

Vicente Luckina Bunn

Tom Hopkins, former Portfolio Manager at BRI Wealth Management now at single family office Guidinglight Investments, analyses the US weekly jobless claims.

Commenting on US weekly initial jobless claims falling less than expectations, Tom Hopkins, former Portfolio Manager at BRI Wealth Management now at Guidinglight Investments, said: “US weekly initial jobless claims fell by 15,000 to 190,000. Well and truly short of the 214,000 figures expected and the fewest since September. This figure bucks the trend of weak retail sales, and manufacturing production data that we’ve seen this week and adds to recent evidence of a tight labour market, giving the FED more of a runway to continue raising interest rates. This result may be surprising given the surge in job cut announcements in recent months, however I do expect claims to rise across the first half of the year but predicting the exact timing of the lift-off is difficult. Tech and cryptocurrency companies have been at the heart of job cutting headlines in recent weeks with Microsoft being the latest to announce a cutting of 10,000 jobs from its global workforce.”