The Conference Board Leading Economic Index for the US recovered from Covid in April with a month-over-month increase of 1.6% to a reading of 113.3.

“With April’s large monthly gain to start the second quarter, the US [Leading Economic Index] has now recovered fully from its Covid-19 contraction — surpassing the index’s previous peak, reached at the very onset of the global pandemic in January 2020,” said Ataman Ozyildirim, senior director of economic research at The Conference Board.

“While employment and production have not recovered to their pre-pandemic levels yet, the US [Leading Economic Index] suggests the economy’s upward trend should continue and growth may even accelerate in the near term,” Ozyildirim said. “The Conference Board now forecasts real GDP could grow around 8% to 9% (annualized) in the second quarter, with year-over-year economic growth reaching 6.4% for 2021.”

Separately, the four-week moving average of US initial claims for unemployment hit another post-pandemic low last week, the US Department of Labor reported. The average fell by 30,500 in the week ended May 15 to a level of 504,750, the lowest since the week of March 14, 2020, when the average was at 225,500.

Total jobless claims fell by 34,000 to 444,000 the week ended May 15. They were also at their lowest level since the week ended March 14, 2020.

Pandemic Unemployment Assistance claims, which are not seasonally adjusted, fell by 8,592 to a total of 95,086. Pandemic Unemployment Assistance program claims include self-employed workers, among others.

Also today, Randstad RiseSmart launched its Labor Market Barometer, which aggregates 10 key labor market indicators into a single, monthly figure representing the pulse of the US labor market.

The Labor Market Barometer rose 17.5 points to a reading of 106.2 in April. That compares to a pandemic low of 88.7 in April 2020. The index has a baseline figure of 100 set in March 2020, at the onset of the pandemic’s economic impact in the US.

“Continued labor market improvement will be highly dependent on the ability to get millions of Americans back to work, especially by boosting labor participation rates in industries that have been heavily impacted throughout this crisis such as leisure, retail and hospitality,” Randstad RiseSmart CEO Dan Davenport said.

The labor market indicators included in the barometer are the unemployment level, unemployment rate, number of employees in the temporary help services industry, initial jobless claims, the ASA staffing index, the percentage of industries that have increase their payrolls in the last month, layoffs, the ISM Index percentage reporting lower volumes in services, the ISM index percentage reporting lower volumes in manufacturing and Google searches on unemployment.