PARIS (Reuters) – The New York Stock Exchange opened lower on Friday after the publication of the monthly report on employment in the United States which showed job creation significantly above expectations in September, which could encourage the American Federal Reserve (Fed) to continue its monetary tightening.

In early trading, the Dow Jones index lost 88.81 points, or 0.27%, to 33,030.76 points and the broader Standard & Poor’s 500 fell 0.41% to 4,240.66 points.

The Nasdaq Composite lost 0.42%, or 56.07 points, to 13,163.755.

An hour before Wall Street opened, the US Department of Labor reported 336,000 non-agricultural jobs created last month while economists polled by Reuters forecast an average of only 170,000.

The unemployment rate, instead of falling to 3.7% as expected, also stabilized at 3.8%, while the only good news for the markets came from a moderation in wage pressures with an increase of the average hourly wage of 0.2% in September, as in August.

“Job creation is well ahead of expectations, the economy looks buoyant and the rhetoric of ‘higher rates for longer’ is likely to become just ‘higher’ rates,” predicts Neil Birrell, investment director at Premier Miton Diversified Growth Funds.

“This will give the Fed headaches, while the rest of us will have to carry out intense reflection,” he added, stressing that the American economy was once again showing its resilience.

In the wake of the publication of the employment report, traders on Friday raised their expectations on Fed rate hikes by the end of the year, now counting with a 50% probability on an increase in rates. federal funds rate in a range of 5.50%-5.75% at the central bank’s December meeting. This probability was only about 34% before the jobs report.

In values, technology groups like Apple, Microsoft, Alphabet and Amazon fell from 0.20% to 0.60%, while the yield on ten-member Treasuries jumped 11.2 basis points to 4.8282%. The dollar strengthened by 0.27% against a basket of international currencies.

The “tech” index dropped 0.22%.

In business news, Tesla fell 2.39% after lowering its prices on the Model 3 and Y in the United States, which raised fears of an impact on the automaker’s margins.

Exxonmobil lost 2.50% and Pioneer Natural Resources jumped 8.5318%, with the two groups in advanced discussions regarding a merger, according to sources.

Levi Strauss & Co fell by 1.28% after a downward revision of its annual forecasts.

(Written by Claude Chendjou, with Ankika Biswas and Shashwat Chauhan in Bangalore, edited by Blandine Hénault)

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