Unemployment claims resumed their rise last week in the United States, exceeding expectations to reach 231,000 new claims against 209,000 the previous week, the Labor Department announced Thursday.
Economists expected an average of 215,000 unemployment registrations during the week ending May 4.
Registrations for the week to April 27 were revised up from an initial estimate of 208,000.
The four-week moving average stands at 215,000 compared to 210,250 (revised) the previous week.
The number of people regularly receiving compensation rose to 1.785 million in the week to April 27 (last week for which these figures are available), in line with expectations and after 1.768 million (revised) the previous week.
(Written by Augustin Turpin)