Bonds & Stocks
Following the recent Treasury rally, bonds barely budged. An unexpected jump in jobless claims reinforced speculation the Federal Reserve will cut rates at least twice this year, with swap traders pricing the first move in September. The dollar fell.
Economy
Initial claims increased by 8,000 to 247,000 in the week ended May 31, a period that included Memorial Day. The median forecast in a Bloomberg survey of economists called for 235,000 applications.
World
With the euro-zone suffering repeated blows from US tariffs, the deposit rate was lowered by a quarter-point to 2% on Thursday – as predicted by all analysts in a Bloomberg survey. The ECB described inflation as “currently at around” its 2% target.