The US dollar ticked up against major currencies after the release of some economic reports during New York morning trading on Thursday. According to a report released by the U.S. Labor Department today, the initial jobless claims edged down to 444,000 from the previous week’s revised figure of 451,000. Economists had expected jobless claims to slip to 440,000 from the 448,000 originally reported for the previous week.
Continuing claims, a reading on the number of people receiving ongoing unemployment help, also fell to 4.594 million in the week ended April 24th from the preceding week’s revised level of 4.653 million.
The Labor Department also said that productivity increased by 3.6 percent in the first quarter compared to a revised 6.3 percent increase in the fourth quarter. The pace of growth exceeded the estimates of economists, who had expected a 2.4 percent increase.
The greenback advanced further against the euro and the British pound in today’s New York mid-day deals. At around 11:45 am ET, the greenback climbed to a more than 14-month high of 1.2655 versus the euro, compared to yesterday’s close of 1.2815.
Against its British counterpart, the dollar jumped to a new multi-week high of 1.4846 by about 11:45 am ET from Wednesday’s New York session close of 1.5104.
After touching a 2-day low of 1.1021 as of 10:00 am ET, the dollar reversed its direction against the Swiss franc and ht a high of 1.1127 within two hours. The greenback-franc pair closed yesterday’s New York session at 1.1183.
The US currency also edged up against other major currencies in today’s mid-morning deals. At 11:50 am ET, the greenback surged up to fresh multi-month highs of 1.0471 against the Canadian dollar and 0.8903 versus the Australian dollar, which may be compared to yesterday’s closing values of 1.0309 and 0.9064, respectively.