All Eyes On This Morning's Employment Report  Image: Bigstock Stocks pulled back a bit yesterday, with the Dow and the S&P holding onto the majority of the previous day's gains. Although, the Nasdaq gave almost all of them back. While the big three indexes are down for the week with one more trading day to go, they're all close enough to be able to turn things around with a little bit of cooperation. The ongoing war on Ukraine continues to weigh on stocks. The Russian and Ukrainian delegations met yesterday for the second round of talks. But no ceasefire was forthcoming. A third round of talks are set for next week. But that's of little comfort to the people of Ukraine, who are fighting for their life. In other news, Weekly Jobless Claims came in better than expected with new claims falling by -18,000 to 215K, easily beating the consensus for 232K. The PMI Composite report came in at 55.9, which was just under last month's print of 56.0. The Services Index also just missed at 56.5 vs. views for 56.7. That was echoed with the ISM Services Index as well which came in at a healthy 56.5, but still under last month's 59.9 and expectations for 60.9. But Factory Orders came in better than expected with a 1.4% m/m gain vs. last month's upwardly revised 0.7% gain and views for 0.5%. All eyes will be on this morning's Employment Situation report released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). You'll remember that Wednesday's ADP Employment Report topped estimates for 320,000 jobs by reporting 475,000 new private sector jobs instead. While the ADP report has a spotty track record of predicting what the BLS report will say, it was still nice to see such a strong beat. The consensus for this morning's BLS report is calling for 390,000 new jobs (330,000 in the private sector and 60,000 in the public), while the unemployment rate is expected to tick down from 4.0% to 3.9%, while the participation rate is expected to tick up from 62.2% to 62.3%. That report comes out at 8:30 AM ET. Should be another busy day today. Best,  Kevin Matras
Executive Vice President, Zacks Investment Research | 
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