PREVIEW: April Labour Force..........>

AUSTRALIA DATA: PREVIEW: April Labour Force Survey; Unempl seen +7.2% vs 5.2%

Mar

------------------------------------------------------------------

-- Markets are expecting unemployment to increase to more than 7% as the

Covid-19 disruptions impacted the economy in April. This would equate to around

500,000 people losing their jobs.

-- In its Statement on Monetary Policy last week the Reserve Bank of Australia

forecast that unemployment will top out at 10% in the June quarter. The RBA

believes high unemployment will persist for some time, and be at 8.5% in

mid-2021.

-- RBA Governor Philip Lowe recently said he expected hours worked to fall by

20% in the June quarter, a result he called a "staggering number."

-- The April number would likely be much higher if not for the Federal

Government's AUD130 billion JobKeeper program, which covers around 5 million

workers, many of whom would otherwise be jobless and adding to the latest

unemployment number.