With the release of the closely watched monthly jobs report looming, the Labor Department released a report on Thursday showing a bigger than expected drop in first-time claims for U.S. unemployment benefits in the week ended September 29th.
The Labor Department said initial jobless claims fell to 207,000, a decrease of 8,000 from the previous week's revised level of 215,000.
Economists had expected jobless claims to edge down to 213,000 from the 214,000 originally reported for the previous week.
Meanwhile, the report said the less volatile four-week moving average inched up to 207,000, an increase of 500 from the previous week's revised average of 206,500.
Continuing claims, a reading on the number of people receiving ongoing unemployment assistance, dipped by 13,000 to 1.650 million in the week ended September 22nd.
The four-week moving average of continuing claims also fell by 15,250 to 1,664,500 from the previous week's revised average of 1,679,750, hitting the lowest level since October of 1973.
On Friday, the Labor Department is scheduled to release a separate report on the employment situation in the month of September.
The report is expected to show employment climbed by about 185,000 jobs in September after jumping by 201,000 jobs in August. The unemployment rate is expected to dip to 3.8 percent from 3.9 percent.
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