The June employment report was crappy and not enough jobs to keep up with population growth. This overview shows the situation is even worse than what is typically reported. Officially there are 12.75 million people unemployed and the unemployment rate is 8.2%.
The June 2012 BLS unemployment report is another abysmal jobs report. Total nonfarm payroll jobs gained were only 80,000. May's payrolls were revised up, from 69,000 to 77,000. April job gains were revised down, again, from 77,000 to only 68,000. The below graph shows the monthly change in nonfarm payrolls employment.
The June 2012 ISM Non-manufacturing report shows the overall index decreased, -1.6 percentage points, to 52.1%. The NMI is also referred to as the services index and the decline indicates slower growth for the service sector.
ADP, released their proprietary private payrolls jobs report. This month ADP is reporting a gain of 176,000 private sector jobs in June. May 2012 was revised up by 3,000, from 133,000 to 136,000. In contrast, the BLS reported 82,000 private sector jobs for May 2012. Graphed below are the reported private sector jobs from ADP.
The Manufacturers' Shipments, Inventories, and Orders report shows a May 0.7% new orders increase after two months of decline. This statistical release is called Factory Orders by the press and covers both durable and non-durable manufacturing orders, shipments and inventories.
The Census, part of the Commerce Department, today released the monthly construction spending report. This is a monthly tally, reported seasonally adjusted, annualized, of how much money was spent on construction. Spending was $830.0 billion in May, up +0.9% from April and an increase of +7.0% from May of last year.
The June 2012 ISM Manufacturing Survey PMI declined, -3.8 percentage points, to 49.7% and indicates U.S. Manufacturing just went into contraction after 34 months of growth. In July 2009 the PMI registered 49%. New orders simply fell off of a cliff and hasn't been this low since April 2009. Prices paid for raw materials absolutely plunged. This is a downright frightening and terrible report.
The BEA released corporate profits for Q1 2012 along with the GDP. Corporate profits after tax are through the stratosphere, up 10.1% from Q4 2011 to $1,644.9 billion for Q1 2012. Corporate profits after tax are also up 13.1% from a year ago.
Barclays was busted for manipulating the LIBOR. The London Interbank Offered Rate is the interest rate banks charge to lend to each other. This key interest rate sets most banking transactions, including retail. Manipulating the Libor is like being a casino with crooked roulette wheels and loaded dice.
Barclays has been fined £290m ($450m) for trying to manipulate a key bank interest rate which influences the cost of loans and mortgages.
Marcus Agius will step down from Barclays as soon as Monday, amid fallout from the bank's $453 million settlement of probe into Libor manipulation.
On Wednesday the U.K's Financial Services Authority announced to the world Barclays manipulated the Libor and was fined. Below is some of the FSA's press release:
The FSA has today announced that it has found serious failings in the sale of interest rate hedging products to some small and medium sized businesses (SMEs). We believe that this has resulted in a severe impact on a large number of these businesses. In order to provide as swift a solution to this problem as possible we have today confirmed that we have reached agreement with Barclays, HSBC, Lloyds and RBS to provide appropriate redress where mis-selling has occurred.
What is America? Home of the brave, land of the free? Or is that what we wish, what we want so desperately to believe. Are we a nation of denial?
Barclays was busted for
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