According to the official payrolls report, employment dropped by 190 000 in October, while a decline by 175 000 was forecasted. The October outcome was somewhat weaker than expected, but the previous two figures were significantly upwardly revised. The September reading was upwardly revised from -263 000 to -219 000, while the August figure showed an upward adjustment from -201 000 to -154 000. All revisions taken into account, employment dropped by 76 000 less than expected. Looking at the breakdown, total private payrolls dropped by 190 000, while government payrolls stayed flat in October. In the goods-producing sector, employment dropped by 129 000 (from -114 000) of which 61 000 in manufacturing (from -45 000). In the service providing sector, employment dropped by 61 000, which was significantly better than in the previous month (-105 000). The civilian labour force dropped slightly (153.975M from 154.006M), while the number of people unemployed rose from 15.142M to 15.700M. In October, the unemployment rate rose to a double-digit level (10.2% from 9.8%), while the consensus was looking for an unemployment rate of 9.9%. Details showed that the rise was not due to more workers losing their jobs, but due to an increase in the number of the unemployment re-entrants. Payrolls at Temporary help agencies, which often lead overall payrolls changes, showed the third consecutive monthly increase and rose by 34 000 in October (from 7 000 in September and 3 000 in August). Average weekly hours worked stayed unchanged at 33.0, while aggregate hours worked continued to decline (98.3 from 98.5). This is the first time since 1983 that the US unemployment rate rose above 10%, which might have scared politicians, the media and households, but the payrolls report wasn’t that bad, as the trend is still showing a slowing in the number of job losses.


EMU: German factory orders rise for the 7th straight month

In September, German factory orders rose by 0.9% M/M broadly in line with the consensus estimate. The previous figure was however upwardly revised from 1.4% M/M to 2.1% M/M. Looking at the details, the improvement was led by consumer goods (7.5% M/M), but also capital goods (13% M/M) and manufacturing orders (0.9% M/M) rose in September. Intermediate goods dropped by 1.1% M/M. The breakdown shows also that the rebound was entirely based in foreign orders (3.7% M/M), while domestic orders dropped by 2.3% M/M.