Saturday 7 April 2012

US employment disappoints, Japanese leading index rises

The US March employment report turned out to be a big disappointment. Non-farm payrolls increased just 120,000, less than the most pessimistic estimate in a Bloomberg survey.

The unemployment rate did fall to 8.2 percent. However, it was mainly due to people leaving the labour force.

The average work week for all workers decreased to 34.5 hours from 34.6 and temporary help fell by 7,500.

While US economic data disappointed, Japanese data on Friday were positive. The leading index jumped to 96.6 in February from 94.5 in January. The coincident index rose to 93.7 from 92.7.

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