Good morning, you're listening to Markets Desk.
Weekly jobless claims edged up to one hundred ninety-nine thousand in the week ending October tenth, according to the Labor Department. That number remains historically tight, still well below the two hundred fifty thousand threshold that typically signals labor market stress, suggesting the employment picture holds firm despite elevated rates.
Shifting to the consumer side, new research out of the UK reveals a growing number of banking customers are turning to AI assistants not out of curiosity, but out of embarrassment. Fear of judgment over financial literacy gaps is driving people away from human advisors and toward chatbots, raising real questions for banks about trust, accessibility, and how they serve customers who feel left behind.
And in the ETF space, a matchup worth noting for investors building small-cap exposure. The Schwab U.S. Small-Cap ETF carries an expense ratio of just three basis points, compared to JPMorgan's BetaBuilders Small Cap offering at nine basis points. Over time that fee gap compounds meaningfully, and for cost-conscious passive investors the difference is hard to ignore when performance profiles run close.
That's the tape. Markets Desk, signing off the floor.
