Non-farm payroll (NFP) employment is an important indicator for financial markets and foreign exchange as it shows the data for the United States jobs in goods, construction, and manufacturing sectors.
It is revealed by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, a unit of the United States Department of Labor, every first Friday of the month at 8:30 ET. If you’re day trading, you should mark this specific date in your calendar several months ahead. You don’t need a financial advisor to do it.
There’s one more reason to follow the non-farm payroll results. Each month you can win 250 USD in a SimpleFX contest. We ask our fans on Facebook for their prediction for the NFP that usually ranges from +10,000 to +250,000, but can go also deep negative during the recession.
To win the prize you don’t have to hit the exact jackpot with your NFP prediction, it’s enough to estimate the closest. All you have to do is to beat your competitors. Just login to Facebook, like SimpleFX page and join a contest by giving your prediction. The prize pool is 250 USD every month!
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Why do we organize the game?
Here at SimpleFX, we promote reactive day trading. If you are interested in any topic, be it cryptocurrency, world politics, and economy, tech or business, you can use the insight you have to make additional profit. Our mission is to provide you with an easy and powerful tool to make the right trade when you see the game-changing news release. With Contract for Difference orders, you can make a profit on any instrument gaining or losing value.
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That is why experienced day traders have cyclical events like the non-farm payroll date set their calendars. Seemingly boring macroeconomics data may influence the markets in many ways. Even if the numbers aren’t unexpected, if there are no other important news that day either, non-farm payroll can move the price of US dollar, as well as stock and bond.
How to use NFP data in day trading?
The indicator compares the current employment situation to the last month. The value is usually between +10,000 and +250,000. The jobs in farming, private household, and non-profit organization employees are not included in the indicator.
Payrolls release show important employment trends. If NFP is strongly positive and the number of people working is on the rise, it means there is are inflationary pressures in the economy, as businesses need to pay more to hire new employees. If the unemployment rate in the US falls below 5% usually the inflation is expected to rise in the next months.
Macroeconomic indicators such as nonfarm payrolls have an influence on the currency rate, that is why it should be watched closely by Forex traders. NFP also includes average hourly earnings, which for the financial markets has a similar impact as the unemployment rate. NFP numbers also provide important data on the situation in different sectors of the economy. This information may have a strong impact on the stock market. Every stock day trader should monitor the NFP or at least be ready for its impact on the day it’s published.
Here’s an example. In September 2018 the unemployment rate fell to 3.7 percent and hit the lowest since December 1969. The data was released on October the 5th and had an impact on markets.
Treasury yields rose to seven-year highs as fast growth was expected to put pressure on the Federal Reserve to raise interest rates. As you can see the jobs report publication resulted in a high spike in the EURUSD, as the dollar weakened tor short while, but later appreciated.
This wasn’t the easiest situation to predict, but undoubtedly it was a great day to trade EURUSD.
You can also see that stock of the US leading corporations may be affected by the release of the nonfarm payroll. Here you can see as Amazon opens high and later drops below the opening.
To sum things up: the first Fridays of each month offer usually a great opportunity for day trading. Join us on SimpleFX Facebook, play the nonfarm payroll results prediction game, and get some free funds to make some high-risk trades with high volatility.
Good luck!
