**As seen in Risk In The Week report 04/15/24, subscribe at cablefxm.co.uk/reports
The Australian economy added 116.5K jobs in February, this was a strong rebound from the prior flat figure and a beat to the consensus survey of 40.0K. The print was the strongest recorded since late 2021. Breaking down the headline, full- time jobs rose by 78.2K while part-time positions increased by 38.3K, the former was the largest uptick since March 2023. February's unemployment rate saw a surprise downtick to 3.7% from 4.1% and reversed the rise seen during the prior months. It will be hard to see a repetition of the prior month's strength as this pace of job growth is unsustainable, some desks have warned that revisions will subtract the February jobs spike.
The desk at Westpac expects a reversal of labour strength in March from an 'unusually strong' February print, they have delivered the lowest projection in the forecast range at -40.0K. If their projections are met, Westpac noted this would be a 90K job growth in 1Q, which is higher than the prior quarter but slower than the same period last year. For the jobless rate, Westpac sees the metric rising to 4.0%, their view is outside consensus.
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