- Prior -24.8K
Unemployment rate: 6.7% vs 6.6% expected
Prior 6.5%
Full-time employment change: -108.4K vs +44.9k last month
Part-time employment change: +24.5K vs -69.7K last month
Participation rate: 64.9% vs 65.0% last month
Average hourly wages (permanent, YoY): 4.2% vs 3.3% last month
Full report here
This is an awful jobs report. The Canadian dollar is selling off across the board.
StatCan notes that "employment declines in February were recorded in services-producing industries (-56,000; -0.3%) and goods-producing industries (-28,000; -0.7%). The largest declines were in wholesale and retail trade (-18,000; -0.6%), and 'other services' such as personal and repair services (-14,000; -1.8%)."
In February, the number of people working full-time declined by 108,000 (-0.6%), offsetting growth recorded over the previous two months. At the same time, there was little variation in the number of people working part-time in February. On a year-over-year basis, there was little change in the number of people working full-time or part-time.
Despite the bleak data, traders are still pricing a rate hike from the BoC by year-end as elevated oil prices continue to drive inflation expectations.
