Productivity at U.S. businesses blew away forecasts in the third quarter and initial unemployment claims dropped to a 10-month low last week the Labor Department said Thursday. The reports raised hopes that the labor market may be starting to bottom.
The news sent the stock markets soaring as the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 204.05 points, or 2.08%%, to close at 10,006.19, while the Standard & Poor's 500 Index popped 20.13 points, or 1.92%, to close at 1,066.63 and the Nasdaq Composite Index gained 49.8 points, or 2.42%, to close at 2,105.32.
Business productivity rose a higher-than-expected 9.5%, its fastest pace in six years, as companies squeezed more output from fewer workers. A survey of analysts by Reuters had projected productivity, or output per hour per worker, to rise at a 6.4% rate in the third quarter.