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Breaking News

June Jobless Rate Rises

Aired July 06, 2001 - 08:32   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: Many call it the most important economic report of the month, just out right now: June's jobless rate, which stands at 4.5 percent. That is up 0.1 of a percent.

Deborah Marchini standing by now to talk about what these numbers mean -- Deb, the trend has been going up.

DEBORAH MARCHINI, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It has indeed. In fact, the unemployment rate was expected to go up more this past month. It should have been up to 4.6 percent by most analysts' perceptions. That would have been a significantly higher level. However, the rate came in line with expectations, or just about that.

Now, the more accurate figure is the nonfarm payrolls. That's based on a survey of businesses and how many people they actually are paying. We were looking for drop of 44,000 jobs. In fact, the number of jobs fell by 114,000 -- that figure considerably weaker than had been expected. And the good news on the inflation front: average hourly earning at four cents an hour increased at 0.3 of a percent. And that's right in line with what was expected.

So, if anything, these numbers, despite the fact that the unemployment didn't go up all that much, are a little on the weak side. We're not really seeing any rallying in the bond market on it. And we're not seeing really much change either in the stock market futures. They're about where they've been all morning. What this tells us is basically that the Federal Reserve likely will stay the course. The employment picture is certainly not strengthening. And further interest rate cuts may be expected.

LIN: All right, thank you very much Deborah Marchini. And we'll keep an eye on developments on Wall Street.

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