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A day ahead of the release of the more closely watched monthly jobs report, the Labor Department released a report on Thursday unexpectedly showing a modest drop in first-time claims for U.S. unemployment benefits in the week ended October 28th.
The report said initial jobless claims edged down to 229,000, a decrease of 5,000 from the previous week's revised level of 234,000.
The dip surprised economists, who had expected jobless claims to inch up to 235,000 from the 233,000 originally reported for the previous week.
