Job Slump Sends Aussie Lower as Rate-Cut Bets Revived
This article is for subscribers only.
Australian employers unexpectedly cut jobs in December, capping the worst year of full-time losses since 1992, sending the Aussie to the lowest in more than three years and reviving prospects for interest-rate reductions.
The number of people employed dropped by 22,600, the statistics bureau said in Sydney today, compared with the median estimate for a 10,000 gain in a Bloomberg News survey of 27 economists. Unemployment held at 5.8 percent as the participation rate fell to the lowest in almost eight years.