SMM: the Labor Department released the latest high-frequency unemployment data on Thursday, local time, and the new data adjustment method significantly reduced the number of people published. But the "better than expected" figure failed to boost sentiment, with the Nasdaq falling as much as 2 per cent at the start of trading.

The number of initial claims for unemployment benefits in the United States last week was 881000, falling below 1 million after rebounding in the previous two weeks and better than the 950000 expected by the market, according to the Labor Department. However, because the data before and after this week are adjusted differently, there is no logical comparability.

A spokesman for the U.S. Department of Labor said that the data from Thursday will be adjusted in a new seasonally adjusted manner, and that the data before Thursday will not be revised at the current time.

Seasonal adjustment refers to regular layoffs that occur at certain times of the year, such as around the holidays. But making similar adjustments during the outbreak would exaggerate the actual unemployment figures. Daniel Silver, an economist at gen Chase, pointed out that since the beginning of March this year, the unadjusted figures have been lower than those released by the Labor Department. IHS Markit, a forecasting agency, said that if the Labor Department made a similar adjustment in March, the number of first-time jobless after that might have been reduced by 4 million.

According to the Labor Department, the number of unadjusted initial jobless claims for the week on Aug. 29 was 833353, up 7600 from the previous week. Ian Shepherdson, chief economist at Pantheon Macroeconomics, said that according to the old algorithm, the number released this week could be 1.02 million.

While adjusting the way data is handled helps to "reduce" absolute values, it clearly does not change the fact that the recession and the historic turmoil in the labour market. Following Friday's closely watched non-farm data for August, the market is expected to add 1.3 million jobs, indicating a slowdown in job growth. A repeat of Wednesday's ADP data, which was "less than half expected", would be a huge blow to stock market sentiment.

Given that the market itself still needs time to evaluate the adjusted data logic, the "falling" high-frequency unemployment data did not form a positive for the US stock market. As of press time, the three indices that just opened continued to fluctuate, with the Dow up 0.02%, the NASDAQ down 2.17% and the S & P 500 down 0.75%.

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