U.S. non-farm payrolls increased by only 49,000 in January

Data released on Feb. 5 showed that the U.S. nonfarm payrolls added 49,000 in January, less than the expected 105,000, and had fallen by 140,000 in December last year.

After experiencing the worst December nonfarm payrolls since April, U.S. nonfarm payrolls stopped falling and rebounded, but still only less than half of what was expected.

It is worth noting that the U.S. unemployment rate in January was 6.3%, lower than the expected 6.7%, a new low since March last year.

After the news, the dollar index fell 11 points in the short term, and spot Gold moved $6 higher in the short term to regain above $1,800/oz. Spot silver was briefly higher by $0.15. U.S. Treasuries were down at 1.15%. S&P 500 stock index futures and Dow futures narrowed their gains, while Nasdaq futures pulled up slightly.

On the face of it, private jobs other than government jobs added only 6,000 positions in January, a far cry from the 163,000 expected, while government jobs added 43,000 positions during the month, led by increased input from state and local governments.

Despite the disappointing overall data, there was some improvement: hourly earnings rose 0.2% in January from a year earlier, slightly below expectations of 0.3%, but on an annualized basis, hourly earnings jumped 5.4%, unchanged from last month’s upward revision and above expectations of 5.0%.

In addition, the average workweek for employees in private nonfarm payrolls increased 0.3 hours to 35.0 hours in January; in manufacturing, the workweek also increased 0.3 hours to 40.4 hours, while overtime remained unchanged at 3.2 hours; and the average workweek for private nonfarm payrolls production and nonmanagement employees increased 0.2 hours to 34.4 hours.