Initial Jobless Claims

Beginner Questions
1

Hi

I’m new to Forex trading, and were hoping someone could help me with the reason for this;

The “Initial Jobless Claims” were published about an hour ago, at 284K. That’s the lowest since Feb. 2006. However, it doesn’t seem to be any big movement in the market. I though that low number should for example move the EURUSD a lot down, however it seems to almost stand still. What’s the reason for this?

Thanks in advance!

2

Initial claims is a weekly data point, so it doesn’t have as big an impact like it’s big brother NFP. Plus, volatility has been declining all year, so unless we get a ridiculously outsized divergence between actual vs. forecast/previous read, it’s tough for this data point to draw a big reaction from the current market environment.

3

It is usually never as simple as good number=rally, bad number=sell-off. It is very layman terms and if you want to become a successful trader you need to dig a lot deeper and fully understand what is going on. True, initial jobless claims dipped below 300K during one week. We will have data out today and it is likely that we will see a full reversal which makes it basically a non-event. There is much, much more that goes into it than simply starring at a headline number and expect pros move on that.

4

The number came in pretty much in line with expectations (302K) but the previous number was revised lower to 279K. That’s probably the reason for the initial spike higher in the Dollar, but the move was faded by the next 15 min bar. Nice call TheLastBear! It looks like broad risk aversion is taking over, which is mixing up the Greenback’s move against the major currencies.

5

Thanks Pipcrawler!