Initial Jobless Claims Fall for Week

Initial jobless claims fell by the most in two and a half years last week, the Labor Department said Thursday.

Jobless claims fell by 53,000, to 357,000 for the week ended Saturday, Labor said.

The drop was more than twice what economists had forecast and was the biggest since September 2005, Bloomberg reported.
 
The four-week moving average, a less volatile measure, rose to 378,250, the highest level since October 2005.

The number of people continuing to collect unemployment benefits for the previous week ended March 29 rose to 2.94 million, from 2.937 million, Labor said.