US: NFP surprised to the upside in January – UOB

Senior Economist at UOB Group Alvin Liew comments on the recently published US Nonfarm Payrolls for the month of January.

Key Takeaways

“There were two major upside surprises in the Jan 2022 US employment report: employment gain of 467,000 and a wage spike of 5.7% y/y, both well above market expectations.”

“However, unemployment rate edged up to 4% in Jan (Dec: 3.9%) as labor force participation rate rose by 0.3ppts to 62.2%.”

“The jobs market continued to make rapid improvements with a strong start to 2022 despite the wave of Omicron-variant infections, but the strong wage growth reflected the difficulties of hiring and inflation worries.”