The Dow Jones Industrial Average is having a rough day in the market today, and for good reason. Early this morning, the United States jobs report for the month of September was released, creating economic concerns. Today, we’ll talk about the report, how the Dow reacted to the news, and what we can expect to see from the index moving forward.
US Jobs Lead To Dow Jones Volatility
As mentioned above, the Dow Jones Industrial Average is having a rough day in the market today after the US jobs report was released for the month of September. Unfortunately, the report missed expectations, and when you do the math, further concerns are found.
In the month of September, only 156,000 jobs were added to the United States economy. While that may seem like quite a bit of jobs, the truth is that any time the US economy consistently adds less than 200,000 jobs per month, economic conditions are a concern. While hiring was expected to come in below the key 200,000 jobs mark, the 156,000 number even came in below economist predictions at 170,000 jobs.
There is one more key piece of data that this information brought about. The information is that year over year, jobs have been slowing in a big way. So far this year, the United states has added approximately 178,000 jobs per month on average. In 2015, the average came in at 228,000 jobs. In 2014, that total came in at 251,000 monthly job additions.
Finally, unemployment data rose for the first time in quite a while. According to the United States Labor Department, the unemployment rate came in at 5%. That’s a gain of a tenth of a percent. While it’s small, it is leading to further concerns.
What We’re Seeing In The Market
At the end of the day, the news moves the market. Positive news will generally lead to positive movement while negative news will generally lead to declines. In this particular case, the news was overwhelmingly negative for the Dow. After all, the US economy plays a big role in the movement we see in the index. As a result, the index has been teetering just below the break even point, unable to get to the green. At the moment (3:13), the Dow Jones Industrial Average is trading at 18,262.20 after a loss of 6.30 points or just 0.03%.
What We Can Expect To See Moving Forward
Moving forward, I have a relatively bearish expectation of what we can expect to see from the Dow Jones Industrial Ahead. While we may see gains in the short term, the end of this year is shaping up to mirror what we saw at the end of last year. As a result, I’m expecting that in December, we’ll start to see incredible volatility in the Dow Jones Industrial Average as investors start to gauge the implications associated with a coming rate hike.
As we move into the year 2017, I’m expecting to see further declines in the Dow. At the end of the day, the global economy still isn’t strong enough to withstand the rate hike. So, in January, we’ll likely see somewhat of a repeat of what we saw early this year. At the end of the day, that’s not good for the Dow Jones Industrial Average!