GLOBAL MARKETS-Stocks surge after U.S. jobs report; dollar slips
(Corrects to show government debt rose, not fell, in paragraph
24)
* Investors shrug off disappointing jobs report, citing
weather impact
* Unemployment rate falls to five-year low of 6.6 percent
* Bond prices rise on the jobs report, economic softness
feared
By Herbert Lash
NEW YORK (Frankfurt: HX6.F - news) , Feb 7 (Reuters) - Global equity markets surged on
Friday as investors set aside any fear of economic softness in a
weak U.S. jobs report, but bond yields and the dollar fell as
the data showed employers hired far fewer workers than expected
in January.
Non-farm payrolls rose by 113,000, well below the consensus
of 185,000, although the unemployment rate hit a five-year low
of 6.6 percent, the U.S. Labor Department said.
The dollar fell broadly as safe-haven gold and U.S.
government debt prices rose on the lackluster report. But stocks
rallied, with investors writing off the weakest two months of
U.S. job growth in three years on inclement weather.
For the week, the S&P 500 easily recouped losses from
earlier in the week that had pushed the U.S. benchmark down to
lows last seen in October. The 2.6 percent surge over Thursday
and Friday was the biggest two-day gain in four months.
The household survey from which the jobless rate is derived
showed strong gains in employment and an increase in the number
of people in the labor force, a reprieve from concerns about a
potential soft patch in the economy.
The proportion of working-age Americans with a job rose to
58.8 percent, the highest since October 2012.
"Markets are increasingly behaving as though the recent
series of soft economic data is truly attributable to bad
weather, and not some broader downturn in demand," said David
Joy, chief market strategist at Ameriprise Financial in Boston.
"It's unlikely that the economic momentum from late last
year simply stalled in December and January," Joy said.
U.S. gross domestic product grew by the most in a decade in
the last half of 2013, the Commerce Department said last week.
MSCI (NYSE: MSCI - news) 's all-country stock index rose 1.2
percent, and its gauge of emerging markets rose 0.89
percent.
The pan-European FTSEurofirst 300 index of leading
shares closed up 0.75 percent at 1,300.11, helped by steelmaker
Arcelor, as investors bet equities would continue to
benefit from the region's gradual economic rebound.
Arcelor rose 0.81 percent to 12.495.
On Wall Street, the Dow Jones industrial average rose
165.55 points, or 1.06 percent, to close at 15,794.08. The S&P
500 gained 23.59 points, or 1.33 percent, to 1,797.02 and
the Nasdaq Composite added 68.739 points, or 1.69
percent, to 4,125.861.
For the week, the Dow rose 0.6 percent, the S&P 0.8 percent
and the Nasdaq 0.5 percent.
"Expectations for the (unemployment) report were too high,
and investors are giving the report the benefit of the doubt
because of the weather," said Donald Selkin, chief market
strategist at National Securities in New York.
After the sell-off earlier in the week, the fact that
equities rose after Thursday's gains indicated there is still
momentum to the bull market, Selkin said.
"Stocks initially got killed after the report came out, but
now we're pretty sharply higher. That's a strong sign that we've
bottomed out," he said.
Though the labor market report called into question the
strength of the economy, the preponderance of most economic data
still shows some pretty good growth, said Anthony Valeri,
investment strategist at LPL Financial (NasdaqGS: LPLA - news) in San Diego.
"We're seeing earnings on track to grow about 9 percent
year-over-year, and as long as that's the case, the pullback in
stocks is likely to be limited," Valeri said.
"The data hasn't been weak enough to suggest that the
current earnings trajectory will deviate," he said.
Earnings have been holding up.
Of the 343 companies in the S&P 500 that have reported
earnings to date for last year's fourth quarter, 67.9 percent
beat analyst expectations, Thomson Reuters (Frankfurt: TOC.F - news) data show. In a
typical quarter since 1994, 63 percent beat estimates.
The dollar index fell 0.29 percent to 80.675, as the
euro gained 0.34 percent to 1.3634 against the greenback.
The dollar rose 0.2 percent to 102.28 against the yen.
U.S. government debt rose, but gains were trimmed as the
session progressed to the close.
The benchmark 10-year U.S. Treasury note rose
5/32 in price, pushing its yield down to 2.6820 percent.
German Bund futures settled up 50 ticks at 143.83,
retreating from earlier highs of 144.02, while cash 10-year
yields on government debt fell to 1.66 percent.
U.S. COMEX gold futures for April delivery settled up
$5.70 at $1,262.90 an ounce.
Oil rose more than $1 to one-month highs, fueled by a sharp
rally in gasoline and heating oil as supplies tightened and
refiners started to shut down plants for maintenance.
Brent crude oil futures rose $2.20 to $109.39 a
barrel. U.S. crude settled up $2.04 to $99.88 a barrel.
GRAPHIC:
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U.S. unemployment: http://link.reuters.com/wam54t
Nonfarm payrolls: http://link.reuters.com/byw66v
U.S. payrolls gap: http://link.reuters.com/kem54t
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(Additional reporting by Blaise Robinson in Paris, Reporting by
Herbert Lash; Editing by Chris Reese, Andrew Hay, Nick Zieminski
and Dan Grebler)