Economy
Due to the federal government shutdown, we didn't get our regularly scheduled jobs report for the month of September. Instead, this week we have to rely on alternative sources, primarily from private companies and the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, to get a read on what's been happening with the economy. Private payroll company ADP reported a net loss of 32,000 jobs last month, a number that is pretty far away from the Dow Jones consensus forecast for the jobs report of +51,000. The Chicago Fed recently unveiled its new Labor Market Indicators dashboard, conveniently about a week before the BLS went dark, and its real-time forecast for the unemployment rate of 4.3% would suggest little change from the last BLS reading in September. Finally, analysts at Goldman Sachs estimated that last week's initial claims for unemployment insurance came in at 224,000, a slight increase from the previous reading of 218,000 from the BLS. There you have it - we've built a Franken-BLS creature of labor market data just in time for the Halloween season.
Markets
The S&P 500 rose 1.09% this week, and closed higher every single day showing little-to-no signs of concern about the government shutdown. That would likely remain in focus next week for markets as we're still not quite into earnings season. The final quarter of the year is historically the strongest of the year for the stock market. We've got a lot of momentum behind the market which has already risen more than 14% this year and is sitting at all-time highs. Ryan Detrick put out some information the other day that shows when the market is making new highs in October, more than 90% of past occurrences led to positive gains for the fourth quarter.
What We're Reading
- Fast & Furious & Way Less Expensive- WSJ
- Have You Answered George Kinder's Questions?- Best Interest
Have a great weekend.
Dogwood Wealth Management