- Australia's unemployment rate slipped to 5.6% in September from 5.7% in August, caused by a fall in the participation rate to 64.5% from 64.7%.
- The number of people in work dropped 9,800 vs a reduction of 8,600 a month earlier and badly missed consensus for growth of 15,000.
- The Australian Bureau of Statistics said that the shift this year to part-time employment continued as the number of full-time positions dropped 53,000 following a decrease of 10,100, while that for part-time jobs grew 43,200 vs -18,600.
- However, one analyst is highly skeptical about the figures due to the problems that the ABS has had with the data over the past couple of years.
- "The numbers are rubbish. No one is going to believe these numbers," says TD Securities' Annette Beacher. "The massive shifts in full-time/part-time is very easy to discount. It's the sort of irregularities seen in recent months."
- The S&P/ASX 200 rose 0.1%, while the AUD-USD is -0.8% at $0.7658.
- ETFs: FXA, EWA, IAF, AUSE, CROC, KROO, EWAS, FAUS, QAUS, HAUD, DBAU