The number of Americans filing claims for unemployment dropped last week, numbers announced by the Labor Department today show.
That raised hopes that tomorrow’s employment number will show the economy added jobs in April. Economists are expecting that data to be reported tomorrow will show that the economy added 160,000 to 180,000 jobs in April.
The consensus among economists is that the official unemployment rate, which doesn’t include discouraged workers who have stopped looking for work or part-time workers who would like full-time jobs, will stay stuck at 9.7%.
 I‘d say today’s data shows progress. But it’s painfully slow progress.
 Initial claims for unemployment fell by 7,000 to 444,000 in the week ended on May 1. That’s the third consecutive weekly drop.
 What’s called the continuing claims number, the number of people continuing to receive unemployment benefits, dropped in the week ended April 24 to 4.59 million.
But part of that drop is a fluke of what the number counts. It doesn’t include the long-term unemployed who have exhausted regular unemployment benefits and are now receiving extended benefits under bills passed by Congress to fight the effects of the Great Recession.
 The number of long-term unemployed who are receiving extended benefits rose by 153,000 to 5.56 million in the week ended April 17.
Ed
See Bloomberg interview with Constance Hunter.
http://www.marketintelligencecenter.com/video.aspx
GOOG under $500!
If this is true, God help us:
http://www.cnbc.com/id/36988229
An ugly market just got uglier.
That was exciting, good thing I’m potty trained…
taterbug,
I’d wait until the current selloff ends. Let the market show it’s at some kind of resistance. THEN we bargain shop!
God bless America!!!!!!!!!!!
Had a feeling we were going to test 10000 again, just didnt think it was going to be today…
This is exciting!! So many potential opportunities again. BRF, ABV, CEDC, RIG, CTRP, GS, etc. When do we start shopping and taking advantage of all these suckers? or is the buyer the sucker? Oh Jim tell us to buy, please!
AAAAAAHHH!!! 🙂
Ed… regarding BP, I’m actually hoping for a little pop and exit the stock. I’m up over 50% but don’t see it doing anything plus the costs for cleanup have me concerned about their dividend.
Is anyone else looking at drilling stocks? I know RIG is popular (or was) with Jim. I hold DO and am looking at expanding my position. Thoughts on offshore drillers? I see this as a temporary issue, especially for those that have rigs throughout the world.
InvestorDude…
I’ve decided to “hang ten” for the duration and curious to know if there are others on the same surfboard. I sold TC a few weeks ago but still have several individual stocks that are certainly taking a terrible beating but hopefully dollar-cost averaging will help later on.
nmac,
I think the chances of Poland joining the EU are approaching my chances of getting Super Bowl MVP.
😉
Run26.2,
As a recent owner of BP (and one lucky enough to sell prior to the spill), I look at BP the same way I do the rest of the oil sector: wait and see.
It’s still a good long term play (I’m talking 10 year horizon), but the world is currently overstocked with oil at the moment.
The recent currency shenanigans (specifically the rise of the dollar) aren’t helping with the price of oil either.
If you wait, there may be better buying opportunities later.
georic, thats correct but CEDC does its business in Poland and Russia which dont use the Euro however i think the fall is linked to increased risk aversion becasue of Greece and the reduced likelihood that Poland will join the Euro any time soon. Thanks for your input in pointed me in the right direction
nmac, since 11/25/2009, the euro has gone down by 16%, expressed in $. Add the fall of the stock exchanges in Europe, you arrive at roughly 25% down.
Hi Jim,
This is off topic, but I was wondering what your opinion is for this market at the moment. I’m taking a beating and am wondering if it is time pull out of some of my positions. As some of the other posters I own TC and was positive until yesterday and it keeps heading further down. Do you have any suggestions? Should we cut our losses and wait for a better day? Thanks.
Off topic… for owners of BP (like me) here is a reason to hold on for a potential pop, however temporary it may be. I have a sell order in, but bumped up my limit after reading this:
“0834 GMT [Dow Jones] NCB Stockbrokers recommends buying BP (BP) ahead of its efforts to stem the flow of oil into the Gulf of Mexico by lowering a giant dome over the leak. “Success early next week would be a major positive catalyst, stemming flow to less than 100m barrels, still huge but only just over a third the size of Exxon Valdez,” says NCB Stockbrokers analyst Peter Hutton. “It would also do much to restore BP in the public mind as a company who has developed the solution not caused the problem.” He also cautions that this technique has not been tried before in such deep water so could encounter problems. Shares +0.8% at 570p. (james.herron@dowjones.com) “
adamadamek,
I commented on TC on the other thread. In summary, I wouldn’t touch it.
adamadamek,
Was considering starting a position at $10, fairly decent support there but i dont have any commodities exposure currently.
TC has been beaten down. Do we buy more or hold steady? Anyone’s thoughts?
Ed,
agreed but i would have thought vodka was a staple in these troubled times ;-)..their results are out tomorrow so im wondering is there a surpirse coming (surprise to some that is!)
nmac,
Keep in mind, CEDC does sell in the European Union (I don’t know the figures off hand), even though they aren’t in it. I suspect that could be why, although a 25% fall seems a bit extreme.
bsdgv,
Employment is a lagging indicator in a recession. But that doesn’t work for a double dip recession. Nor did it work during the Great Depression.
This is NOT your typical recession. I’m not even sure we’ve seen the worst of it yet.
Off topic but i wonder are there any CEDC investors out there puzzled by the 25 per cent fall in the share price in the past 2-3 weeks? I cant seem to find a catalyst but my information sources are limited? Greek contagion, hardly?
any thoughts?
> I wonder how many of those newly hired work for the U.S. Census Bureau?
This question sounds like:
(Un)employment is a lagging indicator!
I wonder how many of those newly hired work for the U.S. Census Bureau?
http://blogs.census.gov/2010census/2010/05/a-note-to-my-600000-new-colleagues.html