Breaking: US Nonfarm Payrolls plummeted by 701K in March

Nonfarm Payrolls (NFP) in the US declined by 701,000 in March, the data published by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics showed on Friday. This reading followed February's increase of 275,000 (revised from 273,000) and missed the market expectation of -100,000 by a wide margin.

Further details of the publication revealed that the Unemployment Rate in March surged to 4.4% from 3.5% and came in worse than analysts' estimate of 3.8%. Moreover, the Labor Force Participation Rate in March fell to 62.7% from 63.4% and the Average Hourly Earnings increased by 0.4%.

Follow our live coverage of the NFP report and the market reaction.

"This news release presents statistics from two monthly surveys. The household survey measures labor force status, including unemployment, by demographic characteristics. The establishment survey measures nonfarm employment, hours and earnings by industry," the BLS explained in its press release. "The March survey reference periods for both surveys predated many coronavirus-related business and school closures that occurred in the second half of the month."

Market reaction

With the initial market reaction, the US Dollar Index, which tracks the greenback's performance against a basket of six major currencies, advanced to 100.80, where it was up 0.68% on a daily basis. 

Meanwhile, US stock index futures extended the losses after this data. As of writing, the S&P 500 futures were down 0.35% on the day.

US Treasury bond yields' reaction to the data was relatively muted with the 10-year reference erasing around 3% near 0.59%.

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