The numbers are in and they aren’t that great.  Although the US non-farm payrolls employment report showed a loss close to previous estimates of 525,000, what is even more disconcerting is the rise in the unemployment rate.  For the month of December, unemployment in the world’s largest economy rose to a whopping 7.2 percent, the highest rate not seen since 1993.  The rise stems from losses in every sector category including financial services and manufacturing, the latter which incidentally showed a trimming of 149,000 positions.  Additionally weighing heavily in the market are the massive downward revisions in the last two months.  Report findings for November were revised to a lower loss of 584,000 positions from 533,000 while October’s shortfall was revised wider to 423,000.  Ultimately, with all things considered, the figure adds to 2.6 million jobs that were lost in 2008, the most in 64 years. 

Market Reactions

Although the report does dole out a good deal of pessimism, the fact that the actual figure was relatively in line with market estimates will likely give the US dollar at least some support in the week’s end session.  With plenty of anticipation of a 600,000 plus figure, attributed by the most recent ADP report, it may be a breath of fresh air for a piece of economic data to be in line with expectations.  As a result, Euro and Pound weakness may likely return to focus as traders pare back profitable weekly runups before the weekend.

Tags: Nonfarm Payrolls, US Unemployment Rate

This entry was posted on Friday, January 9th, 2009 at 9:53 am and is filed under Currency Trading, Economic Indicators, Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.