Unemployment

"Greece is being 'hit', there's no doubt about it," exclaims John Perkins, author of Confessions of an Economic Hit Man, noting that "[Indebted countries] become servants to what I call the corporatocracy ... today we have a global empire, and it's not an American empire. It's not a national empire... It's a corporate empire, and the big corporations rule."

According to the BLS, in June the US added 223K payrolls, less than the expected 233K, even as the the US unemployment rate dropped to 5.3% from 5.4%. Worse, the previous number was revised from 280K to  254K. Worst of all, average hourly earnings were flat despite expectations of a 0.2%, and a big drop from last month's 0.3%.

While we showed what the all important Goldman jobs preview looks like, here is a quick snapshot of what consensus expects will be reported in 15 minutes:

• US Change in Nonfarm Payrolls (Jun) M/M Exp. 233K (Low 160K, High 290K), Prev. 280K, Apr. 221K
• US Unemployment Rate (Jun) M/M Exp. 5.4% (Low 5.3%, High 5.5%), Prev. 5.5%, Apr. 5.4%
• US Average Hourly Earnings (Jun) M/M Exp. 0.2% (Low 0.1%, High 0.3%), Prev. 0.3%, Apr. 0.1%

If it was Greece's intention to crush the Chinese stock market instead of Europe's, well - it succeeded.  Because despite the PBOC and politburo throwing everything but QE at the stock market, China stocks closed down sharply on Thursday after another wild trading day as investors shrugged off regulators' intensified efforts to put a floor under the sliding market, by cutting trading fees and easing margin rules, which has now crashed 25% in about two weeks wiping out $2.5 trillion of the peak $10 trillion in Chinese stock market cap as of June 14. This ultimately resulted with the Shanghai Composite closing under 4000 for the first time since April.

Despite much hopeful banter among the mainstream media, Goldman forecast nonfarm payroll job growth of 220k in June, notably below consensus expectations of 234k. This is roughly in line with Goldman's expectations for below average job growth over the remainder of 2015. Employment indicators were mixed in June: reported job availability, the employment components of most manufacturing surveys, and ADP employment growth improved, but jobless claims and job cuts both rose slightly and online job ads declined. Overall, the June data point to a gain below the very strong 280k increase in May.

"Sometimes I'll find scrap metal that I can sell, although if I see something that looks reasonably safe to eat, I'll take it"...

With all eyes on Greece it would seem another crisis relating to unpayable debt is brewing in the Caribbean. The governor of Puerto Rico, Alejandro García Padilla, has warned that the island is unable to pay its debts of $72 billion.

So much going on that by the time an article is prepared, everything has changed and it has to be scarpped. But, in any event, here is an attempt to summarize all that has happened in another turbulent overnight session.

Every quarter ConvergEx's Nick Colas reviews a raft of unusual and less examined datasets with an eye to refining and adding perspective to the more traditional macroeconomic analyses. This quarter’s assessment of everything from large pickup truck and firearms sales to Google search autofills for “I want to buy/sell” shows a U.S. economy that is reasonably strong but growing only very slowly. The chief areas of concern: Food Stamp participation is still very high at 45.6 million Americans (14% of the total population) and indicators like used car prices and large pickup sales are flat.

When Konstantin Kosachyov, the head of the Russian Federation Council's International Relations Committee, said the protests in Armenia against a 16.7 percent power price hike follow a color revolution scenario sponsored by Western powers, many commentators rushed to compare the crisis in Yerevan with the 2014 protests in Kyiv that toppled the pro-Russian president, Victor Yanukovych. However, the street protests in Armenia have more to do with the overall economic situation in the country than with proxy clashes between foreign countries.

The Greek D-(efault) day has arrived, and with it so has quarter-end window dressing for many underwater hedge funds (recall the S&P is now red for the 2015) which means the rumor mill today will be off the charts. And sure enough, less than an hour ago, futures exploded higher as did the EURUSD, following another "report/rumor" of a last minute detente between Greece and the Troika when Greek Ekahtimerini said that  "Tsipras is reconsidering the last-ditch offer made by European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker, sources have told Kathimerini."

The shining future that America once had is all but a page note in the history books now. Record numbers not in the workforce, failed foreign policies and domestic strife is the new normal. And how is the brain trust in DC going to solve these problems? National service for all 18 - to 28-year-olds!

Moscovici who served as French finance minister until 2014 and then became European commissioner for Economic and Financial Affairs, Taxation and Customs, used some very colorful language, i.e., the French economic situation was "worse than anyone [could] imagine and drastic measures [would] have to be taken in the next two years”. 

It seems Goldman Sachs' conspiracy theory was right all along...

ECB'S COEURE SAYS ECB IS EVEN READY TO USE NEW INSTRUMENTS, WITHIN ITS MANDATE
GREECE COULD EXIT EURO, COEURE SAYS IN LES ECHOS INTERVIEW

This is exactly what The ECB wanted all along (and their leaders overlords) - all they needed was an 'excuse'. Or, in the parlance of Rahm Emanuel's times, "Let no Greek default crisis go to QE waste."

At the open, Europe looked in the abyss, and with no help coming from China, it did not like what it saw: And then the answer came from the Swiss National Bank, which stepped in to prevent the collapse just as Europe was opening. Because seemingly out of nowhere, a tremendous bid came in to life the EURCHF, buying Euros (against the CHF and the USD) and selling Europe's last left safety currency. We now know that it was the SNB, the same central bank which is the proud owner of well over $1 billion in Apple stock.