US Nonfarm Payrolls Plunge to Meager 29K in September

The US nonfarm payroll employment report for September showed a sharp slowdown in hiring momentum and softer wage pressure. The headline number of 29,000 new jobs fell short of the consensus expectation of 90,000, while the unemployment rate rose to 4.2% from 4.1%. The revisions made the report even weaker, with July's payroll growth revised downward from 21,000 to -10,000 and August's upwardly revised to 133,000, cutting the two-month total by 60,000.

Wage growth also cooled down, with average hourly earnings increasing by just 0.1% month-over-month, missing the 0.3% consensus forecast. Annual wage growth stood at 3.0% year-over-year in September. The labor-force participation rate rose from 61.6% to 61.8%, while household employment increased by 406,000, preventing the report from looking like an outright labor-market break.

Hiring breadth was soft across much of the economy, with health care, construction, and manufacturing still adding jobs, but government, information, and professional and business services declining. The overall report suggests a clear loss of hiring momentum and softer wage pressure, strengthened by substantial downward revisions to prior months.