Australian Unemployment Falls in August to 6.2%

Australia’s unemployment rate fell to 6.2% in August despite disappointing economic growth and turmoil on the world’s stock markets.

The total number of people with jobs rose 7,400 in the month, the Australian Bureau of Statistics said on Thursday, which was better than expectations of a rise of 6,000.

The Australian dollar rose on the news and is currently buying to US69.97c. But the statistics could not help the stock market with the S&P/ASX200 down more than 2% at 5,107 points thanks to renewed uncertainty about the Chinese economy.

Full-time employment rose by 1,500, while the number of part-time jobs was up by 5,900. The participation rate, which refers to the number of people either employed or are actively looking for work, fell to 65% from 65.1% in July.

Despite persistent job losses in mining and other heavy industries, sluggish economic growth and headwinds from the global economy, the figures will help the Abbott government’s attempts to push its “jobs and growth” agenda.

via The Guardian

Content is for general information purposes only. It is not investment advice or a solution to buy or sell securities. Opinions are the authors; not necessarily that of OANDA Business Information & Services, Inc. or any of its affiliates, subsidiaries, officers or directors. If you would like to reproduce or redistribute any of the content found on MarketPulse, an award winning forex, commodities and global indices analysis and news site service produced by OANDA Business Information & Services, Inc., please access the RSS feed or contact us at info@marketpulse.com. Visit https://www.marketpulse.com/ to find out more about the beat of the global markets. © 2023 OANDA Business Information & Services Inc.

Alfonso Esparza

Alfonso Esparza

Senior Currency Analyst at Market Pulse
Alfonso Esparza specializes in macro forex strategies for North American and major currency pairs. Upon joining OANDA in 2007, Alfonso Esparza established the MarketPulseFX blog and he has since written extensively about central banks and global economic and political trends. Alfonso has also worked as a professional currency
trader focused on North America and emerging markets. He has been published by The MarketWatch, Reuters, the Wall Street Journal and The Globe and Mail, and he also appears regularly as a guest commentator on networks including Bloomberg and BNN. He holds a finance degree from the Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher Education (ITESM) and an MBA with a specialization on financial engineering and marketing from the University of Toronto.
Alfonso Esparza