Here are some details from the Friday Jobs Report as reported by the Wall Street Journal Saturday/Sunday edition (excerpts repeated below are available on-line)…
“The economy added 146,000
jobs in November…around its recent average…..Service jobs were the biggest
gainers…retailers alone added over 53,000 jobs.”
There were “…downward
revisions to payroll figures for September and October. Together the revisions wiped out 49,000
jobs….Economists often watch the direction of revisions for signs of where the
job market is headed: Figures are often revised up in an improving economy and
down in a worsening one.” - WSJ
Longer term, one trend is
a very problematic. The share of total
population working (chart below on the right from the WSJ) has been falling
since the recession and is now at levels not seen since 1981. This means that while the economy has been
improving, it is not creating enough jobs to keep up with the growing
population and, additionally, many have simply given up looking. (On a side
note refering to 1981, I might add that the market peaked slightly before Jan 1981 and fell 25%
to a bottom in 1982. That was the end of
the 1966-1982 Cyclical Bear market.)
Wall Street Journal at…
HUSSMAN ON JOBS REVISIONS
(and recession)
“The September and October
payroll figures are already being revised lower, consistent with the historical
tendency (noted by the Economic Cycle Research Institute) for data to be revised higher prior to the
start-date of a recession and then lower after the start-date...I continue to view the
U.S. economy as being in a recession that began in the third quarter of this
year...I would characterize the most recent data as being negative but stable –
not accelerating to the downside.” – John Hussman, PhD, Weekly Market Commentary
for 10 Dec 2012 from Hussman Funds at http://www.hussmanfunds.com/
MORE JOBS ANALYSIS –
GALLUP SURVEY
(from Mish Shedlock, Mish’s
Global Economic Trend Analysis)
“Gallup's seasonally
adjusted unemployment rate is 8.3% for November, up nearly one percentage-point
over October's rate. Gallup's underemployment jumped from 15.9% to 17.2%."
"The Gallup survey (released Thursday), which polls approximately 30,000 people monthly, was radically different from the BLS report that came out a day later...In the BLS report, the labor force magically shrunk by 350,000 artificially lowering the unemployment rate. No such thing happened in the Gallup survey for the unemployment rate to blast .9 percentage points higher...if the latest Gallup survey is correct, expect to see jumps in the BLS unemployment rate in the coming months.” Full analysis and charts from Mike "Mish" Shedlock at http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/#8KDzaRKkh7xlZ7lr.99
"The Gallup survey (released Thursday), which polls approximately 30,000 people monthly, was radically different from the BLS report that came out a day later...In the BLS report, the labor force magically shrunk by 350,000 artificially lowering the unemployment rate. No such thing happened in the Gallup survey for the unemployment rate to blast .9 percentage points higher...if the latest Gallup survey is correct, expect to see jumps in the BLS unemployment rate in the coming months.” Full analysis and charts from Mike "Mish" Shedlock at http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/#8KDzaRKkh7xlZ7lr.99
CMT: It’s hard to be know which way to go with such
opposing views on the jobs data. Friday
Doug Short said the data was “encouraging.”
I don’t like it though – John Hussman is beginning to look right at this
point. Time will tell.
NTSM RECESSION INDICATOR
The NTSM recession
indicator (comparing the Morgan Stanley Cyclical Index to the S&P 500 is
now suggesting investors are positioning for a possible recession since the long-term
trend is that the cyclicals are falling while the S&P 500 is flat. On the shortest term (today) that wasn’t true
and cyclicals out-performed. All I can
do is watch this and see which way the trend goes. For now, it remains leaning toward recession.
CHART TRENDS
It turns out that the area
of S&P 1420 that I mentioned in Friday’s blog is the 50-dMA and that is also a key
point for the moving average followers.
The market broke above 1420 during the day, but couldn’t manage to close
there. If it can’t break 1420 we’ll be
going down.
MARKET RECAP
Monday the
S&P 500 was up about 1/2-point to finish unchanged at 1418 (rounded). VIX rose about 1% to 16.05.
NTSM
The NTSM analysis remained HOLD Monday. All NTSM indicators are neutral.
Other market indicators are turning down.
Market internals have gone flat and look like
they are rolling over to the downside along with the Smart Money (last hour)
buying), so I say again…I think this bounce is ending.
MY INVESTED POSITION
Based on the SELL signal, 7 November 2012, I
moved out of the stock market at 1377 on the S&P 500. Because of the extreme negativity I have
noted from Hussman and others, I am currently invested in a range of near 15%
invested in stocks and I am still holding short positions.
