The Biggest Story this Coming Week: Initial Jobless Claims

More or less Biggums'? That's the question this week and the result will move the market one direction or another.  On Thursday (Sept 24th) brings the most important report of the week: the Labor Department's weekly report on initial jobless claims. Last week, the Labor Department said initial jobless claims fell to 545,000, the lowest level in two months, from a revised 557,000 in the previous week.   That number needs to come in lower otherwise its going to a Bear selling party.

Wells Capital's Jim Paulsen told theStreet.com that the jobless claims need to fall below the 500,000 level in order to show a recovery is in the works. Paulsen said "The most important report this week will be the claims number," Paulsen said. "I would argue, and this is from a bull, that the initial claims numbers have not come down more rapidly. I want to see that number moving. There are a lot of data that show me a V-shaped recovery but claims isn't one of them. It's highly volatile, yes, but it needs to make a bigger move lower to fit with a lot of the other information we're getting." 

In addition to the jobless claims data, investors will grapple with the August reading on existing home sales, which economists expect will rise to 5.33 million units from 5.24 million in July.

Happy Safe Trading this week fellow Masters.

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