Remember the now traditional economic data weakness that the US experiences come every Spring in the past 3 years courtesy of the rotation out of artificially boosting winter seasonal adjustments? Well, after a big miss in the PMI and ISM we may be getting just that, with the ADP private payrolls data moments ago posting the lowest monthly increase since October at just 158,000, well below the 200,000 expected, and far below last month's revised 237,000 (was 198,000), which means that post the revision the February number is just 1,000 off the NFP print of 236,000: ADP, under Mark Zandi, now and always desperately trying to be a BLS echo chamber. Notably in the breakdown of jobs, March saw +0 Construction jobs added: hardly the stuff great housing recoveries are made of. The good news, if any, is that small business finally were the biggest generator of jobs, adding 74,000, or just less than half of total, with medium and large accounting for 37,000 and 47,000 respectively. And since, empirically, the revised ADP methodology has been far more accurate than previously, the question is how to pre-spin this Friday's jobs number, which stands at the near-ADP consensus of 196,000, which suddenly looks far more in peril of a downside miss.
From the report:
"The U.S. private sector added 158,000 jobs in the month of March 2013, with the majority of the new jobs created by service providers," said Carlos A. Rodriguez, president and chief executive officer of ADP. "Over the first quarter of 2013, the ADP National Employment Report has reported an average gain of 191,000 new private sector jobs per month."
Mark Zandi, chief economist of Moody’s Analytics, said, “Job growth moderated in March. Construction employment gains paused as the rebuilding surge in the wake of Superstorm Sandy ended. Anticipation of Health Care Reform may also be weighing on employment at companies with close to 50 employees. The job market continues to improve, but in fits and starts.”
March data snapshot:
[4]
Change in total private employment: lowest since October. Some recovery:
Historical Trend - Change in Total Nonfarm Private Employment
Total Nonfarm Private Employment by Company Size
Change in Total Nonfarm Private Employment by Selected Industry
And the now generic exciting, social-network friendly inforgraphic:
Source: ADP [5]