Australian Dollar Little Changed Despite Loss in Employment Growth

Talking Points:

• Australian Dollar Little Changed after Jobs Data
• Unemployment Rate 6.2% vs 6.2% expected
• Australia lost2.9K jobs in the month of April

The Australian Dollar remained little changed after April’s Employment data fell short of expectations. Economists were expecting the country to add 4K jobs in the month of April; actual figures proved to be slightly lower at 2.9K lost. Most of the jobs lost came from the full-time figures (-21.9K). On the brighter side, the country added 19K part-time jobs in April. The unemployment rate increased to 6.2 percent from 6.1 percent in March. The participation rate remained unchanged at 64.8 percent.

Markets are no longer expecting a rate cut from RBA in the upcoming months because of the central bank’s stance on household demand and employment sector. While the country lost 2.9K jobs in April, revisions to the upside in employment change over the past 2 months outpaced actual declines. RBA talked down rate cut expectations on Tuesday and today’s data may have not been sufficient enough to change the markets perception of the bank’s stance on monetary policy.