(Reuters) – The New York Stock Exchange opened in the red on Friday after the release of the U.S. Department of Labor report which showed that the U.S. economy had created far more jobs than expected in January, a scenario that fuels fears over the monetary policy of the Federal Reserve (Fed).
In early trading, the Dow Jones index lost 102.24 points, or 0.30% to 33,951.70 points and the broader Standard & Poor’s 500 fell 1.10% to 4,133.86 points.
The Nasdaq Composite lost 2.01%, or 245.32 points, to 11,955.50 points.
The US Labor Department on Friday reported 517,000 non-farm payrolls created last month, while economists polled by Reuters forecast an average of 185,000.
“The numbers are definitely well above consensus estimates. That’s not what the market wants to see, nor what the Fed wants to see at this point,” said Quincy Krosby, strategist at LPL Financial.
“This is the kind of report you want to see coming out of a recession to signal the strength of the economy, not when the futures market is looking at the Fed ending its rate hike cycle,” he added.
The Fed hiked interest rates by 25 basis points on Wednesday and, after the release of the jobs report, the market revised upwards the likelihood of another identical hike at the March meeting of the Fed. US central bank.
The markets are still awaiting the publication of the ISM services index at 15:00 GMT.
The jobs data is accompanied by disappointing results released Thursday by stock market giants such as Apple, Alphabet and Amazon, which fell 0.6%, 4.5% and 5.7% respectively. opening, putting an end to the improvement in high-growth stocks over the last two sessions, driven by the good results of Meta Platforms and the hopes of a slowdown in the rise in rates.
Ford, which on Thursday reported a decline in quarterly profit and forecasts a difficult year, fell 10.1%.
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(Written by Diana Mandiá, edited by Blandine Hénault)
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