The economic news out of the U.S. this morning will provide a boost to the trading day. The Labor Department is reporting that first-time applications for unemployment benefits plummeted to a 34-month low last week. In another report, Labor says that U.S. workers boosted their productivity at the fastest rate in 18 months in the third-quarter.

Initial jobless claims fell by a larger-than-expected 43,000 to 348,000. The four-week average dropped by 10,000 to 380,000, the lowest level since March 2001. This beat economist expectations of a decline of 6,000.

Meanwhile, non-farm business productivity grew at 8.1% from July through September. The pace was the fastest since the first quarter of 2002, and an increase from an already-robust 7% clip in the second quarter of this year.

After markets closed Wednesday, Cisco posted higher sales and a quarterly profit of US$1.09 billion. That’s an increase of 76% from last year.

In Canada, Magna International is reporting a 20% rise in third-quarter sales. But operating profits were flat and a one-time accounting loss cut net earnings to US$48 million from US$132 million last year.

Asian stock markets closed lower overnight. The Nikkei Stock Average of 225 issues declined 285.24 points, or 2.63%, to 10,552.3. Tokyo’s losses weakened sentiment in Hong Kong, where banking giant HSBC was hit by interest rate worries. The Hang Seng Index lost 288.83 points, or 2.3%, finishing at 12,150.09.

In London at midday, the FTSE index rose 0.16%, Frankfurt’s DAX moved up 0.07% and Paris’s CAC 40 gained 0.17%.

The Bank of England raised interest rates by onee-quarter percentage point to 3.75% amid signs of strength in the U.K. economy. The ECB left rates unchanged at 2%.

On Wednesday, the Toronto’s S&P/TSX composite index closed up 3.99 points to 7,867.68.

In New York, the Dow Jones industrial average closed down 18 points to 9,820.83. The Nasdaq composite broke on to positive ground late in the day to eke out a gain of 1.41 points at 1,959.37. The S&P 500 was off 1.44 at 1,051.81.