With the more closely watched monthly jobs report looming, the Labor Department released a report on Thursday unexpectedly showing a modest decrease in first-time claims for U.S. unemployment benefits in the week ended August 27th.
The report showed initial jobless claims edged down to 232,000, a decrease of 5,000 from the previous week's revised level of 237,000.
The dip came as a surprise to economists, who had expected jobless claims to inch up to 248,000 from the 243,000 originally reported for the previous week.
