Jobless claims just hit 1.974 million. That’s the highest since November 2021. Not a bump. Not seasonal noise. It’s been climbing for weeks. Up another 38,000 this time. That’s not recovery. That’s erosion.
“Continuing Jobless Claims went up by 38K to 1.974M for the week ending July 26.” https://www.fxstreet.com/news/us-initial-jobless-claims-rose-to-226k-last-week-202508071234
“Continuing claims soared by 38,000 to 1.974M, ahead of the 1.95M print expected by economists.” https://www.sharecast.com/news/international-economic/us-initial-jobless-claims-shoot-past-consensus–20575852.html
“Jobless claims filings rose to 226,000, from 219,000 a week earlier… Continuing claims came in at 1.97 million—the greatest since November 2021.” https://www.morningstar.com/news/dow-jones/2025080710059/us-jobless-claims-rose-last-week
“Nonfarm payrolls increased by 73,000 jobs in July, after rising by a downwardly revised 14,000 in June… The unemployment rate rose to 4.2%.” https://finance.yahoo.com/news/us-job-growth-sharply-slows-125727618.html
Nobody’s hiring. Payrolls are stalling. Revisions are brutal, 258K wiped off the books. Unemployment ticking up. Claims creeping higher every week. And the yield curve? Still flat. It should be steepening. It’s not. Credit spreads haven’t moved. They will. This is how it starts.
The yield curve typically trades with continuing claims data. The yield curve should steepen more aggressively if claims continue to rise; credit spreads will then follow. pic.twitter.com/B0mUvHQSh1
— Michael J. Kramer (@MichaelMOTTCM) August 7, 2025
“An increasing number of borrowers are falling behind on both their student-debt and mortgage payments — a development that’s worrying economists about the state of the housing sector and the broader U.S. economy.
Student-loan delinquencies are rising sharply, as are delinquencies on mortgages backed by the Federal Housing Administration, according to a new report by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.”