Welcome to NFP day

As such, that will likely make for a quieter session in Europe with traders waiting in anticipation of the main event. The headline estimate is for non-farm payrolls to rebound to +200K, with the bounce owing to a recovery from Hurricane Milton and the end of the Boeing strike among other things.

But no matter what the number might show up today, the chart above shows how there is a clear downtrend in the non-farm payrolls figure over the last few years. And if anything else, it reaffirms softening labour market conditions and that is something that the Fed has been alluding to when embarking on the rate cut cycle.

Their argument is that while conditions are softening, it is still not that bad. And at this point, the odds are still pointing towards the notion that they will almost certainly cut rates again later this month.

It will be a very, very tall order to convince them otherwise. And even with a beat above +200K on the headline, I don’t think it will compel policymakers to change their minds. Not least when the trend above clearly shows how the labour market is progressing going into next year. And also the fact that this month’s number might be skewed by other factors as mentioned.

The unemployment rate is expected to tick a little higher still to 4.2%, up from 4.1% in October. But that shouldn’t tell us too much barring any major surprises.

All else being equal, markets might jump to look for something from the numbers in the jobs data today. However, they might struggle to find anything meaningful amid all the caveats to the non-farm payrolls figure. At the balance, the Fed will carry on accordingly to cut again in December.

This article was written by Justin Low at www.forexlive.com.