Economists expect another 2.1 million Americans filed for unemployment insurance last week

• US economists are forecasting that an additional 2.1 million Americans filed for unemployment insurance in the week ending ending May 23, according to Bloomberg data.
• The Labor Department will release the official report Thursday.
• While declining claims show the US is beyond the peak of layoffs, "until those workers are able to come back and continuing claims begin to decline, sustained improvements in consumer and business sentiment will likely remain elusive," said Deutsche Bank economist Justin Weidner in a Friday note.

Millions of Americans are still filing for unemployment insurance on a weekly basis, even after many states begin to open their economies from lockdowns to contain COVID-19.

US economists are forecasting that an additional 2.1 million Americans filed for unemployment insurance in the week ending ending May 23, according to Bloomberg data.

That would be a decline from the 2.4 million that filed for benefits in the previous week, but still show an elevated rate of joblessness in the US. The Labor Department will release the weekly report Thursday morning.

Read more: GOLDMAN SACHS: These are the 20 stocks hedge funds piled into most aggressively last quarter — and history suggests they're set for big gains

The falling rate of weekly claims suggest that the US is "well beyond the peak of inflows into unemployment," wrote Deutsche Bank economist Justin Weidner in a Friday note. However, initial claims remain in the millions, and continuing claims — people who are actively receiving benefits — continue to rise, which suggests that job opportunities are quite limited, according to the note.

"Until those workers are able to come back and continuing claims begin to decline, sustained improvements in consumer and business sentiment will likely remain elusive," Weidner said.

Going forward, all eyes are on the May jobs report, set to be released next Friday, June 5. In April, US employers slashed a record 20.5 million jobs, and the unemployment rate surged to 14.7%, the highest since the Great Depression.

Most economists expect that job losses — while still in the millions — will decline from April. Still, it's likely that the unemployment rate could surge even higher, and by some estimates even threaten the all-time estimate of roughly 25% during the Great Recession. Since the measurement period for the April jobs report, an additional nearly 16 million Americans have filed for unemployment benefits.

"That's 12% of employment as of mid-April or 6.1% of the population at that same point," said Nick Bunker, an economist at Indeed. "The May jobs report won't provide the same visceral shock the April report did, but it will show continued damage to the labor market," he said.

Read the original article on Business Insider