The Paris Bourse (+0.3% to 7,110, in anemic volumes) is trying to recover a little on the eve of the weekend, and was counting on the publication of the 'NFP' at 2.30 pm to reassure itself.

And a pleasant surprise, 'official' US job creation for June came in well below expectations (209,000 vs.000 vs. 245,000 expected), and totally contradicted ADP's meteoric figures of the previous day (+495,000)... the publication of which would have triggered the downward spiral observed the previous day (a drop of over 3% from the previous day).

The fall in stock market indexes had been accompanied by a sharp rise in bond yields in anticipation of a tightening of the Fed's monetary policy.
The markets should therefore have been reassured this Friday, but the NFP is proving to be a non-event, and neither stock market indexes nor bond markets have rallied since 2.30 pm.
Quite the contrary, with the CAC40 erasing half of its gains posted around 2.15pm, and OATs and Bunds continuing to deteriorate: +1Pt to 3.201% and 2.64% respectively, i.e. from +25Pts to +30Pts (for Italian BTPs) over the week, which is enormous.

T-Bonds even rocketed from 4.04 to 4.10% before calming down a little to 4.06%.
Wall Street began the session in the red, with the Dow Jones at -0.2% (it had rebounded strongly from its lows the previous day), the VIX remaining more or less unchanged (but it has risen by +2Pts to 15.5 this week).

The Paris market endured a difficult week, characterized by four sessions in the red (for a cumulative decline of close to -4%), a consolidation movement which finally led it to breach its major support at 7,350 and then 7,150 points.

For several months now, some analysts have been worrying about the 'cognitive dissonance' of the markets, which prefer the 'rosy' scenario of no recession ('soft landing') and rapid normalization of inflation.

Job creation in the US slowed sharply in June, but the unemployment rate eased to 3.6% (from 3.7% in May) and wage increases exceeded expectations, revealing a still-contrasting picture of the labor market.

The number of jobs created last month was 209,000, whereas the market was expecting 245,000. On the other hand, statistics for May and April were revised downwards, from 339,000 to 306,000 and from 294,000 to 217,000 respectively (i.e. -110,000 in total).

Average hourly earnings rose by 12 cents, or 0.4%, to nearly $33.6, giving an annual salary increase of 4.4%.

The morning's figures had little impact on the CAC: France's trade balance stood at -9.2 billion euros in May 2023, according to the French Customs Department. It was stable over the month, after recovering by 0.3 billion euros in April.
Imports and exports both rose by 0.4 billion to 60.5 billion euros and 51.3 billion euros respectively.

France's current account balance recorded a deficit of 700 million euros in May, following a revised deficit of 1.7 billion euros in April, according to CVS-CJO data published Friday by the Banque de France.

On the currency front, the euro resumed its ascent to 1.0920, i.e. +0.25%, while gold resisted and even recovered by +0.3% to $1.923.


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