Gold just had a rough day at the office. Spot prices tumbled as much as 2.4% on Thursday, settling near $4,400 per ounce after the Bureau of Labor Statistics dropped an August employment report that made the labor market look a lot healthier than anyone expected.
The culprit: US nonfarm payrolls surged by 162,000 in August, roughly tripling the consensus forecast of 53,000 to 65,000.
The numbers behind the selloff
The unemployment rate held steady at 4.1%, suggesting the labor market isn’t softening the way some economists had predicted.
Prior months got revised upward too, with June gaining an additional 31,000 jobs and July adding 21,000 more than previously reported.
