Heads up on the Non Farm Payroll report

Early Friday morning the Department of Labor will be releasing the jobs report for the month of June and while I don’t expect a huge number(+250k), I would be surprised if it is weaker than +50k and flabbergasted if it is negative.  The weekly jobless number that comes out every Thursday morning at 8:30 EST has moved above 400,000 every week for over 2 months now.  This generally does not bode well for a robust jobs number, but today’s ADP private employment figure was up by 157,000 when the consensus was for +60,000 and so now all the forecasters are re—jiggering their Friday number to accommodate for this higher number.  The ADP number is not directly correlated to the Department of Labor’s figure as the ADP data is from the private sector whereas the government’s number also includes federal, state and local government hiring, but over time the trend of each seem to coalesce.  The consensus for the government’s number is +100k, but the real telling point is the internal data as the private sector should have created jobs nicely while the government probably was a net looser of jobs and the unemployment rate will probably stay at 9% or so but could move even higher as more job seekers got off the couch and are again looking for a job which pushes the rate higher.   They have not been counted in the survey as they have not been looking for employment.  Not enough has been made of the fact that over the last the six months or so, the unemployment rate while high at 9.1% is probably much higher and could be 16-17% as the truly unemployed and those who are part time workers not by choice but by force creates a scary picture of a terribly weak hiring environment.   The economy which hit a soft patch in May, but appears to be finding some traction and should move higher in the second half of the year as the problems in the Japan supply chain and flooding in the Midwest will be resolved.  I stated publicly on a talk radio show in the middle of June that the market pundits were far to negative and the stock market should move higher and like a blind squirrel that will inevitably find a nut once in a while, the next day the market went on a tear rising close to 6% in 8 trading sessions.  I am still bullish for the second half just not as much now, but if we get a good number Friday (+250k or more), then I think the market can move higher as that is not built into the market’s current level.