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JPM: Job Losses Won’t Be As Significant As Anticipated By Seasonal Factors

US OUTLOOK/OPINION
  • JPMorgan are above consensus for nonfarm payrolls in January, forecasting 225k (cons 183k) consisting of 180k private and 45k govt.
  • “January is usually a month with net job losses before seasonal adjustment as cold weather weighs on employment in some sectors and the holiday shopping season, which temporary lifts activity, is wound down. But we think these job losses won’t be as significant as anticipated by the seasonal factors given the recent tightness in the labor market and that this will result in strong job growth after seasonal adjustment.”
  • They point to jobless claims data showing "very favorable seasonally adjusted readings in much of the first half of January as the jump in filings that the seasonal factors anticipated was not fully realized and the seasonally adjusted data improved". A similar thing occurring in Jan 2023 and corresponded with seasonally adjusted nonfarm payrolls growth of 472k that months.
  • That said, “January 2024 looks different than January 2023 is many respects (fewer unfilled job openings, softer preceding trend for job growth, less favorable changes in temperatures, and some recent downbeat signals on employment like the ISM services survey’s employment index) so we don’t look for as meaningful of a pickup in job growth in January 2024 as we saw in January 2023".
  • Elsewhere, they see AHE growth of 0.3% M/M whilst the u/e rate holds at 3.7% despite participation rising to 62.6%.

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