01.05.2014 14:36:43

U.S. Weekly Jobless Claims Show Unexpected Increase

(RTTNews) - Offsetting some of the optimism about the labor market generated by yesterday's ADP report, the Labor Department released a report on Thursday showing an unexpected increase in initial jobless claims in the week ended April 26th.

The report said initial jobless claims climbed to 344,000, an increase of 14,000 from the previous week's revised level of 330,000. The increase came as a surprise to economists, who had expected jobless claims to dip to 320,000 from the 329,000 originally reported for the previous week.