Fed Taper May Occur on Further Good Jobs Data

Wall Street is braced for the Federal Reserve to start tapering back its bond-buying program in September, if job growth in August is anything like it was in July.

That’s the current conventional thinking about the Fed’s unconventional quantitative easing program, which has helped balloon its balance sheet to $3.65 trillion.

In the market’s view, the August employment report, released at 8:30 a.m. ET Friday, has become the key data point for the Fed, since employment is an important metric for its easy money policies. Economists expect 180,000 nonfarm payrolls were created in August, the average rate of monthly job growth during the recovery, according to Thomson Reuters data. They also forecast no change in the 7.4 percent unemployment rate. Job growth in July was 162,000.

CNBC

This article is for general information purposes only. It is not investment advice or a solution to buy or sell securities. Opinions are the authors; not necessarily that of OANDA Corporation or any of its affiliates, subsidiaries, officers or directors. Leveraged trading is high risk and not suitable for all. You could lose all of your deposited funds.