Weekly Update
Last week, US large-cap stocks fell by more than 1% for the first time in two months. In addition, the NASDAQ Index logged its worst week in over five months, falling 2.6%. Even solid economic data which was fueled mostly by a solid job report (over 200k jobs added) and rising wages (the fastest rise since 2009) were not enough to lift the markets. Why? It appears three major concerns loomed: Downward pressure related to threats of trade wards, fear of the already heated and expensive stock market, and uncertainty on how rising wages and a shortage of qualified labor will affect US markets in the coming months.
This week, we saw the US stock market rebound. As of Thursday, we had four straight days of gains in the S&P 500, NASDAQ, and DJIA. News that China may be receptive to overtures from the US related to trade discussions soothed the trade jitters momentarily.
So, just how good is the job market?
According to the Labor Department
, the number of jobs in the US exceeded the number of job seekers by more than 650,000 in July and the gap is actually growing. The number of available jobs in the US grew to 6.94 million in July – the highest number on record since collecting this data in 2000 – and the number of unemployed decreased to 6.28 million.
