🎈 Surprise!: December Non Farm Payrolls

• Surprise = Actual - Consensus, -241K = 199K - 440K

• December Non Farm Payrolls came at the lower end of the forecasts range, printing at 199K. Having consensus seen an addition of 440K jobs, the downside surprise was 241K and marked the second consecutive month of headline misses, however, this is smaller than the November surprise of -325K

• This downside surprise is not the widest print recorded for the last year and at 199K, the three-month average is unchanged at 313K. As a reminder, we have not seen three-consecutive Non Farm Payrolls headline misses since January 2021

• Looking at a 5-year history of Non Farm Payrolls headline surprises, the average surprise now stands at +193K, standard deviation at 355K