“The imbalanced nature of the UK economy remains a concern,” added Mould. “The services industry continues to perform better than manufacturing and the gap between sentiment in the two has started to grow again, having narrowed during the second half of 2015.”
Investors’ eyes will turn to look across the Atlantic this afternoon as the latest US jobs numbers are released. A significant overshoot of expectations for around 160,000 new jobs would be perceived as bringing a Fed rate rise closer while falling a long way beneath would likley push it further back in the year.
“Today’s US jobs report will take on an increasingly important role over the next month as we seek to see whether the data facilitates the summer rate hike seemingly desired by many at the Fed,” said IG market analyst Joshua Mahony. “The inclusion of the near 40,000 Verizon employees on strike during May will do little to help the cause, yet the Fed are sure to look past this making any reading above 160k pretty respectable.”
