Boosted by the return of striking workers, job growth was stronger than expected in November, with the BLS reporting 199K new jobs versus the forecasted 180K. There were no revisions to October, but September was revised down by 35k jobs. The unemployment rate unexpectedly fell 0.2% from October to 3.7%. Despite this beat, we expect the Fed to stay on hold next week.
Pending Home Sales
Pending Home Sales (signed contracts on existing homes) surged 8.3% from November to December, due in large part to falling mortgage rates per the NAR. Their Chief Economist, Lawrence Yun,