Why You Can't Trust U.S. Weekly Jobless Claims

The 'Helicopter Economics Investing Guide' is meant to help educate people on how to make profitable investing choices in the current economic environment. We have coined this term to describe the current monetary and fiscal policies of the U.S. government, which involve unprecedented money printing. This is the official blog of the New York Investing meetup.

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The market was ecstatic with the November 25th U.S. weekly jobless claims figures. According to the report the number of Americans filing for unemployment fell 35,000 from the week before, dropping to 466,000. Bullish headlines such as "Jobless Claims Plummet to 14-Month Lows" were all over the web. Commentators immediately started gushing about unemployment turning around and job gains being just around the corner. Stock futures perked up, the U.S. dollar continued a sell off already well underway, and gold which had been rallying strongly turned down on the news.

As for myself, I stopped paying attention about 15 years ago to the weekly jobs claim number the week of the release. Why? At that time, there was also an unexpected major drop in the claims figures. The markets went crazy on the news. One week later, the number was revised sharply upward with a statement from the BLS (Bureau of Labor Statistics) that one state had not gotten their figures to the department a week earlier so they hadn't been included in the totals. While the BLS knew this at the time, it did not inform the public of this important inaccuracy. The error was quite substantial as well, since the state that didn't report was obviously California. It should also be noted that the November 25th report was released on a Wednesday, one day earlier than usual, because of the Thanksgiving holiday on Thursday. It is quite possible not all the state data came in early enough to be included.

At the same time the weekly jobless claims were released, the monthly Durable Goods and Personal Spending reports also came out. Durable goods declined 0.6% for October indicating a weakening economy. A drop in defense spending was blamed (just another form of government spending propping up the U.S. economy). However, orders for cars, machinery (needed for factories), computers and communication equipment (both needed for offices) also fell. Personal spending was up 0.7% in October. This is hard to believe considering U.S. consumer credit has had a major drop in the last year and the over 10% unemployment rate has negatively impacted consumer income. Where is the money coming from for the increases in spending?

The most significant market action on the release of all this data was the falling U.S. dollar. The trade-weighted dollar cut through the recently established 75.00 support level and traded as low as 74.40 in early morning New York trading. There is a strong band of support between 72.00 and 74.00. Expect a bounce off the top of that band initially, with an eventual test of the 2008 low around 71.50. While the dollar hit another yearly low, spot gold hit another new all-time high, trading up to $1183.80. Expect to see more of the same in the future.

Disclosure: Long gold, no dollar positions. Long time critic of the BLS.

NEXT: Desert Bubble Bursts, Blows Sand in Market's Face

Daryl Montgomery
Organizer,New York Investing meetup
http://investing.meetup.com/21


This posting is editorial opinion. Like all other postings for this blog, there is no intention to endorse the purchase or sale of any security.

U.S. Unemployment Rate Rises to 13.9%

The 'Helicopter Economics Investing Guide' is meant to help educate people on how to make profitable investing choices in the current economic environment. In addition to the term helicopter economics, we have also coined the term, helicopternomics, to describe the current monetary and fiscal policies of the U.S. government and to update the old-fashioned term wheelbarrow economics.

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The Jobs Report for January was out this morning and even the official figures are grim. While the headline number stated an unemployment rate of 7.6%, the report itself had another unemployment rate of 13.9% buried within in. The 13.9% rate includes discouraged workers, those who have given up looking for work, and those who are working part time (even an hour a month), but want to work full time. Keep in mind these are the government's own figures. You can certainly substantially increase the top line 7.6% if you want something more realistic. The BLS (Bureau of Labor Statistics) itself will be doing so in the future as is.

Upward revisions have been the name of the game for job losses and the unemployment rate for many months now. The first figure which gets all the press coverage isn't as bad as the revision that takes place a month later and that in turn isn't as bad as the revision a month after that. As an illustration, October 2008 job losses were first reported as only 240,000, then a month later as 320,000, and then finally as 423,000. November started out as 533,000, then became 584,000 and is now 597,000. December was initially reported as 524,000 and is now 577,000. Expect it to be higher next month. There is almost 100% probability that the 598,000 lost jobs for January will be a bigger number in February and March. It is already the biggest loss since the 602,000 decline in December 1974 (the peak number for the worst recession since the 1930s).

The monthly revisions aren't the only ones conducted by the BLS either. There is also an annual benchmark revision done at the end of the year. This year's revision found that there were 311,000 less employed people than previously reported. This downward revision means that there were 3 million jobs lost last year, instead of the 2.6 million reported last month. This number exceeds the 1945 figure of 2.8 million jobs lost, which happened because of the closing down of defense manufacturing and decommissioning of millions of soldiers. There is no bigger number since that date until 2008. Any greater number would have take place during the Great Depression.

The bad news in today's Jobs Report were presaged by yesterday's Weekly Jobless Claims, which came in at a deep recession level of 626,000 (the highest since October 1982). The figures in this report indicated 4.8 million people were receiving unemployment benefits, even though the actual figure is 6.5 million. The 1.7 million receiving extended benefits are not included in the first number. It should also be kept in mind that a majority of the American labor force does not qualify for unemployment benefits and thus will never show up in these figures. As bad as the U.S. employment situation appears to be, assume it is much worse than the official figures indicate.

NEXT: Short term, the Market is Looking Better

Daryl Montgomery
Organizer,New York Investing meetup
http://investing.meetup.com/21

This posting is editorial opinion. Like all other postings for this blog, there is no intention to endorse the purchase or sale of any security.