Breaking : U.S. Unemployment Rate Unchanged At 3.7%, More Jobs Added In December

The U.S. has reportedly added 216,000 jobs during December, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ most recent data on nonfarm payrolls. The data reported on Friday saw an upscale in the number of jobs added in December as compared to 199,00 jobs in November.

More jobs were added in December, Will the U.S. Fed keep rates steady?

The U.S. nonfarm payrolls data suggests more jobs have been added in December, beating the expectation of economists polled by Reuters. Economists had expected an average of 170,000 jobs being created in December.

The report by the Bureau of Labor Statistics also suggested that the unemployment rate was unchanged at 3.7%. The market on the other hand was expecting a tenth of an increase to 3.8%. The labor force participation rate for the month came in at 62.5%, decreasing by 0.3%.

Stronger-than-expected data adds fuel to the supposition that the American economy might not be slowing down any time soon.

With the labor market holding up, perhaps the U.S. Federal Reserve will still need to stress the message of keeping the rates a bit longer than what the market has already priced in.

The probability for a March Fed rate cut currently stands at about 65%, according to CME Group’s FedWatch Tool.

Market Reaction

The dollar inched higher with the U.S. Dollar Index (DXY) shooting above 103 after the jobs data report came in. With a stronger greenback, The FTSE 100 and stocks across the US were in negative territory.

Crypto markets however were range-bound, being largely impacted by the speculations around the SEC’s approval of Spot Bitcoin ETF. At the time of writing, both Bitcoin and Ethereum were trading 0.3% down, according to Coinmarketcap, after pairing some gains earlier.

Bitcoin’s 24-hour trading volume was above $20 billion at the time of writing, plunging 0.8% in the previous 24 hours. Ethereum on the other hand surged 0.59% in the past 24 hours with a trading volume of over $11 billion.