YES!!!!!!!!
Und die Arbeitsmarktdaten in USA sind mehr als Beschissen--> RATE CUT noch vor dem 18.09.2007.
U.S. Payrolls Fell 4,000 in August; Jobless Rate Holds at 4.6%
By Bob Willis
Sept. 7 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. economy unexpectedly lost jobs in August for the first time in four years, raising the risk the economy may stall in the second half and serving as a warning for the Federal Reserve to lower interest rates.
Employers cut 4,000 workers from payrolls, compared with a revised gain of 68,000 in July that was smaller than previously reported, the Labor Department said today in Washington. The unemployment rate held at 4.6 percent as almost 600,000 people left the workforce.
``Rate cuts will be right around the corner,'' Chris Rupkey, senior financial economist at Bank of Tokyo Mitsubishi UFJ Ltd. in New York, said before the report. ``At this stage, they don't need the cover of any more weak economic data to act.''
The drop in jobs is the clearest sign yet that the deepening housing recession and turmoil in credit markets are hurting the wider economy. Payrolls are one of the main factors, along with sales, incomes and production, that help determine the starting point of economic contractions, and today's report may raise the odds the Fed reduces rates even before the Sept. 18 meeting.
Economists surveyed by Bloomberg News had forecast that payrolls rose 100,000 during the month, according to the median of 88 estimates, compared with an originally reported 92,000 gain in July. None of the analysts foresaw a decline, as predictions ranged from 35,000 to 140,000.
Revisions subtracted 81,000 workers from payroll figures previously reported for June and July.
Wages gained 3.9 percent in August from a year earlier. Workers' average hourly earnings rose 5 cents, or 0.3 percent, after a 0.3 percent increase the previous month.
Source of Losses
Manufacturers, builders and the government led the drop in payrolls last month. Factory payrolls slid by 46,000, the most since July 2003, after slipping 1,000 a month earlier. Economists had forecast a drop of 10,000 in manufacturing employment.
Payrolls at builders dropped by 22,000 after falling 14,000 a month earlier. Government payrolls decreased by 28,000.
Service industries, which include banks, insurance companies, restaurants and retailers, added 60,000 workers last month after boosting payrolls by 78,000 in July, the report showed. Retailers added 12,500 jobs after hiring 5,000 in July.
Average weekly hours worked by production workers held at 33.8. Average weekly earnings gained to $591.50 last month from $589.81 the prior month.
Fed Chairman Ben S. Bernanke last week said the central bank would do what's needed to prevent the credit-market turmoil from undoing the six-year economic expansion.
`Act as Needed'
The Fed ``continues to monitor the situation and will act as needed to limit the adverse effects on the broader economy that may arise from the disruptions in financial markets,'' he said at the Kansas City Fed's annual symposium in Jackson Hole, Wyoming.
Bernanke said the Fed would ``pay particularly close attention to the timeliest indicators'' since data prior to August didn't capture the credit crisis. Futures contracts are pricing a certain cut in the benchmark federal funds rate at the central bank's policy meeting Sept. 18.
The Labor Department's employment survey of businesses covers the week of Aug. 12, at the height of the decline in global stock markets, suggesting the figures won't reflect the full extent of the damage done by the subprime tumult.
Job and wage growth are needed to help sustain consumer spending, which accounts for more than two-thirds of the economy, as home values fall and loans become more difficult to get. Spending slowed to a 1.4 percent annual pace in the second quarter, down from 3.7 percent the previous three months.
Paring Workforce
First American Corp., the largest U.S. title insurer, said this week it would cut 1,300 jobs, or about 3 percent of its workforce, to reduce costs as home sales slow.
LandAmerica Financial Group Inc., a Richmond, Virginia-based title insurer, said Aug. 28 it will eliminate 1,100 jobs in the second half of 2007 to reduce costs as mortgage originations decline.
Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. and Accredited Home Lenders Holding Co., both in the U.S., and HSBC Holdings Plc in London said last month they would cut a total of 3,400 jobs as tremors from the collapse of the subprime-loan market spread through the economy. At least 15 mortgage companies have filed for bankruptcy and about 50 have stopped lending or shut down entirely.
Declines in residential construction have detracted from overall growth for the last six quarters, and the housing slump is prompting economists to warn of rising risks of recession.
Harvard University economist Martin Feldstein, who heads the group that dates U.S. contractions, said Aug. 31 there is a ``significant risk'' of a recession.
``Downturns in housing construction have almost always been followed by a downturn in the economy, by a recession,'' Feldstein said in an interview from Jackson Hole. ``My judgment is there is enough of a risk that the Federal Reserve should be responding to that risk'' by cutting interest rates.
To contact the reporter on this story: Bob Willis in Washington
That will be the break out for Gold!
