US Non-farm Payrolls Below Expectations, Unemployment At 5.2% in August

The USA has published their non-farm payrolls data for August on Friday, that stayed below market expectations. The employment scenario report by the Labor Department stated - the key non-farm payrolls component is up only 235,000, compared to a rise of 720,000 as was expected by the market insiders. Earlier, non-farm payrolls increased 943,000 in July. The unemployment rate has been 5.2% in August, compared to the 5.4% unemployment rate seen in July - meeting the expectations. In August, President Joe Biden had announced an economic agenda by proposing a $3.5 trillion tax and spending package, which was backed positively by the state's House. Now the data shows that this amount certainly is going to play a key role in the country's recovery path.

Earlier, the US Fed Chair Jerome Powell sounded dovish about the economic growth than other members, as he said that the Fed might start tapering at the end of this year, but they would not hike interest rates any time soon. The non-farm payroll data shows that Chair Powell was quite correct about his position of not backing off from the Quantitative Easing (QE) soon, and taking a policy of wait and watch. However, today US Dollar index went down only marginally.

Impact on gold rates

The labor data was not as good as expected, proving a delayed economic recovery - that poured water to the chances of interest rates hike and better bond yield. Hence, the investors will not probably swipe their money out from gold to government bonds now, and gold prices will remain high. The undermined US jobs data left a positive impact on the international gold prices as the spot gold price was up by $16.60 at $1,827.20/oz, in line with the silver spot price of a 0.47% hike. Comex gold was last up by 0.84% at 8.00 EDT. In India, this trend impacted similarly, and the MCX October gold futures were up by a marginal 0.71% till 6.40 PM IST. Indian gold rates are determined by international gold prices. As the industry insiders were expecting better US jobs data, that could impact gold rates negatively, are now relived reasoning the gold rates will not drain out soon. However, earlier in August, the first week when the July non-farm payroll data went out positively, the gold rates fell drastically back then.