Jobs Report Preview

What’s in Today’s Report:

• Jobs Report Preview (The Ideal Number for Markets and a Word of Caution for this Report)
• Why the Starbucks (SBUX) Guidance Cut Caught My Attention

Futures are sharply higher after the U.S. and China confirmed trade talks will occur in early October (better late than never from a market standpoint).

The talks will be high level, with the three key principles (Liu He, Lighthizer and Mnuchin) all attending.

Economically, the only notable number was German Manufacturers’ Orders, which badly missed expectations, falling –2.7% vs. (E) -1.5%.  But that soft report was ignored on the kneejerk optimism of more U.S./China trade talks.

Focus today will turn back towards data now that we have a confirmation of future U.S./China trade talks, and the key reports today are (in order of importance):  ISM Non-Manufacturing Index (E: 54.0), ADP Employment Report (E: 150K) and Jobless Claims (E: 215K).

As has been the case since the Fed’s “hawkish cut,” good economic data will be positive for stocks, although at these levels the S&P 500 is trading well above the recent trading range, despite a lack of any actual progress in fundamentals.