Long-awaited US GDP report for Q4 2020 was released today at 1:30 pm BST. Data showed that the US economy grew at an annualized 4.0 % QoQ slowing from a record 33.4% expansion in Q3 when the economy started to recover from the coronavirus hit. Today’s reading came in line with market expectations. Considering full 2020, the economy contracted 3.6%, the worst performance since 1946, and following 2.2% growth in 2019.
Core personal consumer expenditures, the favored measure of inflation at the Federal Reserve, rose to 1.4% year-on-year from 3.4% in the previous month and above consensus estimates of 1.2%.
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Open real account TRY DEMO Download mobile app Download mobile appThe number of Americans filling for unemployment benefits was 0.847 million in the week ended January 23rd, compared to 0.900 million reported in the previous week. Today’s reading came in below market expectations of 0.875 million. Claims are far from the 200 thousand level reported back in February and will likely remain elevated for some time as the pandemic is far from controlled although vaccination already started.
Continuing claims reading, which lags initial jobless claims data by one week, reach 4.771million, while analysts expected decrease to 5.054 million. It is the lowest level in continuing jobless claims since the pandemic began back in March. Today’s reading still remain much above 1.7 million average reported before the pandemic.
EURUSD saw a relatively small reaction to today’s data releases. The most popular currency pair continued to trade around 1.2100 level. Source: xStation5