Economics Update

Well, let's start with the jobless numbers, where the press is reporting that initial claims fell last week, the 4 week moving average fell from 571K to 566.25K, and continuing claims fell by 119K to 6.13 million.

The lede is the fall in initial claims, only the the fall in initial claims was actually an increase:

The NYT article on weekly unemployment insurance (UI) claims carried the surprising headline: 'first-time U.S. jobless claims fall again.' The reason the headline is surprising is that claims rose the prior week, from 561,000 to 576,000, a number that was revised up to 580,000 in the new report. So, claims did not fall again.

The 4 week number is much more sound, because this us done all the time: comparing new numbers with revised ones, it's a pet peeve of mine, along with the fact that no one ever mentions that the fall in continuing claims numbers is largely an artifact of people exhausting their benefits or moving to extended unemployment benefits.

**sigh**

I would also note that the GDP number for the 2^nd quarter of 2009 contracted at a -1.0% annual rate, and that this is somehow considered good news.

Still, it looks like the GDP numbers have made people less risk averse, which has pushed Treasuries' prices down, and their yield up.

Me, I'm more concerned by the fact that the FDIC's problem bank list has mushroomed to 400.

It appears that the "improving" GDP numbers has reduced the need for a currency safe haven, pushing the dollar down, and they also pushed oil prices up.