(eToro Blog) The ADP employment report released today showed that 325,000 positions were created in December. The figures are adjusted on a seasonal basis. The ADP report precedes the Non-Farm payrolls report due tomorrow. The ADP report captures data in the private sector. According to the ADP report, the services sector added 273,000 positions in December compared to 176,000 positions in November. The goods sector added 52,000 positions and the manufacturing sector added 22,000 jobs. Large sized companies added 37,000 positions and medium sized companies added 140,000 positions in December. Small sized companies added 148,000 positions in the month of December. The October ADP employment figures were revised down to 204,000 from the initial print of 206,000.
Initial jobless claims, another benchmark for the labor conditions, dropped to 372,000 in the week that ended December 31. The drop of 15,000 from the previous week indicates that employers have reduced their firings and are looking to stabilize head count. The four week moving average which is a less volatile measure of jobless claims dropped to 373,250. This is the lowest level seen in the last 3.5 years.
The Institute of Supply Management’s Services PMI gauge rose to 52.6 in December from 52 in the month of November. The index fell short of analyst expectations of 53.0. The U.S. economy is primarily a services based economy. Of the major components, production stayed at 56.2% and new orders rose 0.2% to 53.2%.
While the ADP employment report was a positive for the U.S. economy, Wall Street indices declined on negative sentiment from Europe. The Dow is down 0.73%, the Nasdaq is down 0.3% and the S&P 500 is down 0.6% at the time of writing this report. Traders on OpenBook are primarily long on the Dow (DJ30) with average limits at 12,450 and stops at 12,200.
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