Jobless Claims Near 57-Year Low: Why Low Layoffs Keep Rates High
Layoff headlines are everywhere, yet U.S. jobless claims just fell to 194,000, near a 57-year low. The catch: hiring is stalled, and a job market that isn't firing gives the Fed room to keep fighting inflation. Here's what that means for your mortgage, your credit card, and your business loan, and what to watch when the Fed decides on October 28.
The Jobs Report Missed Badly and Stocks Rallied: Decoding the "Bad News Is Good News" Trade
Employers added just 29,000 jobs in September, far below forecasts, and the prior 2 months were revised down by 60,000. Stocks rallied anyway. The reason is a rate-hike repricing that only works inside a narrow band: soft enough to stay the Fed's hand, not soft enough to threaten earnings. Here's how that band works, and why the October 14 CPI report could break it.
The 10-Year Treasury Yield Just Hit a 24-Year High — and a Softer Inflation Report Couldn't Stop It
The 10-year Treasury yield just broke its 2007 peak and hit its highest level in 24 years — the morning after inflation came in cooler than expected. When good news can't bring long-term rates down, the bond market is sending a message. Here's what's really driving yields, how it hits your mortgage and portfolio, and the 3 jobs-report scenarios that could decide what happens next.
Jobs Crushed Expectations and Stocks Fell Anyway: Why 162,000 Jobs Just Raised September Rate Hike Odds
The August jobs report was a blowout: 162,000 jobs added against a 56,000 forecast, with unemployment steady at 4.1%. Stocks fell anyway. The reason isn't complicated once you see it — this report didn't change the economy, it changed the Fed's constraint. Here's the mechanism, why the 2-year Treasury moved before equities did, how oil at $91.48 opens a second inflation channel, and what Thursday's PPI and Friday's CPI will actually decide.
Rate-Hike Odds Just Fell to a Coin Flip. The Same Day's Data Said Not So Fast.
Stocks rallied Thursday after Fed Governor Christopher Waller signaled he could support holding rates steady in September. But Waller offered a conditional, not a commitment — and the same morning's ISM report showed services prices at their hottest since August 2022 with employment contracting for a second straight month. Here's why the market's reaction function has inverted, what the three jobs-report scenarios actually mean, and what would prove this thesis wrong.
Rate Hike Odds Jump to 57%, Nvidia Falls 4.6%: How One Jackson Hole Speech Repriced the Entire Market
Nvidia gained 8.7% on AI guidance Thursday, then fell 4.6% Friday on news that had nothing to do with Nvidia. What changed was the price of money. Fed Chair Kevin Warsh put the 2% target back at the center of the market, September rate hike odds jumped from roughly 35% to 57%, the 2-year Treasury yield rose 13 basis points to a one-month high, and gold dropped 3%. Here's the full causal chain, the falsification test for whether it holds, and the three scenarios for the August jobs report.