NVIDIA CORP (NVDA) 12.90 -$0.08 (-0.62%) 09:20PM (15 mins delay)

After what was a yawnfest Friday morning, the afternoon session started with the key Non Farm Payrolls which were weaker than expected across the board. Payrolls fell -190k vs. the -175 the market expected. The Household survey showed a dramatic decline of -589k and the U.S. unemployment rate shot up to 10.2% (a 26-year high). Manufacturing, construction and retail trade all showed bigger losses in jobs than expected. In fact, the only reason payrolls did not fall further was the increase in government employment. Hours worked failed to increase, which is a major negative as it means that employers are nowhere near the hiring phase. The length of unemployment is at an all time high of 26.9 weeks.

There was also a big jump in temp jobs (i.e. skilled workers serving burgers and fries at McDonalds (MCD)). Average hourly earnings were up 0.3, which will trigger some concerns about inflation pressures building, but Washington will be concerned about this payrolls number and I would not be surprised to see some kind of job tax credit being discussed to incentivise employers into hiring. In my view, this completely takes off the table any hint of higher rates or reduced liquidity provisions until late 2010 or even into 2011, as the Fed specifically told us Wednesday that they were looking at slack in resource utilisation (employment) as one of their key triggers. And if you thought that was gloomy, the doomiest among us are obsessed with U-6, also known as The Real Unemployment Rate, because it measures discouraged workers who aren’t actually looking for work. Anyway, that number soared to 17.5% from 17% last month. That’s a huge month-over-month jump.