November 6, 2025 | Daily JAM, Morning Briefing |
Layoffs accelerated in October from an already alarming level in September, according to newly released data from Challenger, Gray & Christmas, a company that tracks workplace reductions. U.S. employers have announced 1.1 million layoffs so far this year–the worst reading since the pandemic recession and on par with 2008 and 2009 job cuts during the Great Recession. The data includes a recent spate of layoffs at major companies such as UPS, Amazon and Target.
October 29, 2025 | Daily JAM, Morning Briefing |
But what about December? To no one’s surprise–even my pet turtle Pericles saw this one coming–the Federal Reserve cut its benchmark short-term interest rate at today’s October 29 meeting by a quarter point to a range of 3.75% to 4%.Two members of the Fed’s Open Market Committee voted against the quarter-point increase. Stephen Miran, whom Trump appointed days before the committee’s last meeting in September, once again voted for a larger 50 basis point cut. Jeffrey Schmid, the president of the Kansas City Fed, voted for leaving rates unchanged. What was interesting to me about the meeting was how hard Fed chair Jerome Powell tried to talk down expectations for another cut at the December 10 Fed meeting. Going into today’s meeting the financial markets were pricing in a 90% chance of another cut in December.
October 9, 2025 | Daily JAM, Morning Briefing |
The market continues to price in another 25 basis point cut in the Federal Reserve’s benchmark interest rate at its October 29 meeting. The CME Fed Watch tool put the odds of a cut at 94.6% today. Odds of an additional 25 basis point cut at the Fed’s Dec 10 meeting area only slightly less robust at 81.5% according to the CME Fed Watch tool. But ahead of those two likely cuts to the Fed’s very short-term target interest rate, longer-term yield rose today. The yield on 2-year Treasuries advanced two basis points to 3.60%.
October 1, 2025 | Daily JAM, Morning Briefing |
The news from the ADP private sector employment survey this morning wasn’t good. Private-sector payrolls decreased by 32,000 in September and the August numbers were revised lower to show a 3,000 decline. The number of jobs lost in September exceeded all estimates in Bloomberg’s survey of economists.
September 29, 2025 | Daily JAM |
If there’s a government shutdown tomorrow–which looks very likely right now–there’s a good chance that the Bureau of Labor Statistics won’t release the jobs and unemployment numbers for September on Friday. BLS had been struggling with staff shortages even before the shutdown, so it really wouldn’t be much of a surprise if the shutdown pushed off the release of the report on job creation for September and the unemployment rate. Which would be of interest mostly to stat wonks except that the Federal Reserve meets at the end of October to decide whether or not to cut interest rates and by how much, and except that investors ad traders are trying to figure out how to position their portfolios.
September 27, 2025 | Daily JAM |
Expect macro ad micro news in the coming week to, potentially, move stocks. The macro? The September Jobs Report will be released on Friday morning before the financial markets open. . Economists expect a weak tally of 50,000 job additions and the unemployment rate to hold steady at 4.3%. With investors and traders pricing in a 90% chance that the Federal Reserve will cut interest rates again by another 25 basis points, I’d say the risk is that the economy will have added significantly more than that 50,000 estimate. That seems unlikely–which is why the risk is in a stronger than expected report. The micro? Auto sales, auto sales, auto sales.
September 26, 2025 | Daily JAM, Morning Briefing |
Inflation, as measured by the Personal Consumption Expenditure (PCE) index, the Federal Reserve’s preferred inflation index, rose 0.3% in August and attain annual rates 2.7% over the past year. Core inflation (taking out volatile energy and food prices) was up 0.2% over the month and 2.9%, yearly. Each of these rates came in at expectations. Each rate remains above the Fed’s target of 2% inflation. In other data today, annualized consumer spending growth was revised upwards to 1.6% through August. To be sure, 1.6% isn’t blazing spending but it is solid growth. So nothing has really changed in the economic picture.
September 18, 2025 | Daily JAM, Morning Briefing, Uncategorized |
The Dot Plot economic projections published by the Federal Reserve yesterday are really an extraordinary document.
September 17, 2025 | Daily JAM, Morning Briefing |
The Federal Reserve lowered its benchmark interest rate by 25 basis points at its meting today. The Open Market Committee projected two more quarter-point reductions this year. And pointed to one additional interest rate cut in 2026 and another 2027.
September 15, 2025 | Daily JAM, Morning Briefing |
I expect big drama and suspense from the Federal Reserve on Wednesday, September 17. Oh, not from the Fed’s decision on interest rates. The Fed Funds Futures market is pricing in a 96% chance that the Fed’s Open Market Committee will cut the benchmark interest rate by 25 basis points to a range of 4.00% to 4.25%, according to the CME FedWatch tool. That seems about right to me. No, the drama and the suspense will come from inside the Fed. Will chair Jerome Powell be able to hold a consensus around just a 25 basis point cut? Will the Fed’s quarterly revision of its Dot Plot economic projections shows that the Fed is contemplating aggressive future interest rate cuts or that the central bank is worried that inflation is about to spike? Those opinions will have a huge effect on Treasury yield, especially at the long end 10-year notes.
September 1, 2025 | Daily JAM, Morning Briefing |
Expect another critical jobs report on Friday from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The report comes a little less than two weeks before the Federal Reserve meets on interest rates on September 17. Economists project that the economy added 75,000 jobs in August and that the unemployment rate ticked up to 4.3%. in the month from 4.2% in July. The four straight months of sub-100,000 payrolls growth would mark the weakest stretch since the onset of the pandemic in 2020.
August 29, 2025 | Daily JAM, Morning Briefing |
Today’s core Personal Consumption Expenditures inflation report, the Federal Reserve’s preferred inflation measure, came in with a 0.3% increase for July. All items PCE inflation rose 0.2%. The annual core inflation rate was at 2.9% in July. The all-items annual rate was 2.6%.
Those numbers were right at economist expectations. But that’s part of the problem: without a surprise slowdown in inflation, it looks like the inflation rate is stubbornly stuck significantly above the Fed’s target of 2.0%. And if inflation is stuck at this level, it will be hard for the Federal Reserve is aggressively cut interest rates
