9/4/09

In general economic news ahead of this 3-day weekend here in the US, overnight it was relatively quiet in rate-land. This morning, however, the jobs data (which typically comes out on the first Friday of every month) was stronger than expected. Nonfarm Payroll was “only” down 216,000 jobs in August, although the headline Unemployment Rate hit a 26-year high at 9.7%. An interesting side note is that the labor force increased by 73,000 in August, indicating the return of some jobless workers who had given up looking for work accounting for part of the rise in the unemployment rate. The August numbers, although bad, indicated that perhaps the pace of layoffs was easing from early this year. After the news we find 30-yr mortgage security prices only slightly worse. There is no early close for the bond market, but really, who wants to be at work on a Friday afternoon ahead of a holiday?