United States JOLTS Job Openings shatter expectations: What the surge to a two-year high means for the US Dollar

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United States JOLTS Job Openings shatter expectations: What the surge to a two-year high means for the US Dollar

US Job Openings rose in April to 7.618 million, way above the 6.88 million expected.
DXY trades near 99.20 following a brief spike after the release of US JOLTS data.

The number of job openings in the United States (US) came in at 7.618 million in April, up sharply from the revised 6.887 million in March, the US Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) reported in its Job Openings & Labor Turnover (JOLTS) report on Tuesday. This reading came in above the market expectation of 6.88 million and marks the highest level of job openings since May 2024.

"Over the month, hires decreased to 5.1 million, and total separations decreased to 5 million," the BLS noted in its press release. "Within separations, quits (3 million) were little changed while layoffs and discharges (1.7 million) were also little changed."

US Dollar Price Today

The table below shows the percentage change of US Dollar (USD) against listed major currencies today. US Dollar was the strongest against the New Zealand Dollar.

	USD	EUR	GBP	JPY	CAD	AUD	NZD	CHF
USD		-0.06%	-0.09%	0.13%	-0.01%	-0.20%	0.13%	0.06%
EUR	0.06%		-0.02%	0.17%	0.04%	-0.14%	0.20%	0.11%
GBP	0.09%	0.02%		0.19%	0.06%	-0.08%	0.23%	0.11%
JPY	-0.13%	-0.17%	-0.19%		-0.13%	-0.31%	0.01%	-0.09%
CAD	0.00%	-0.04%	-0.06%	0.13%		-0.18%	0.14%	0.03%
AUD	0.20%	0.14%	0.08%	0.31%	0.18%		0.32%	0.20%
NZD	-0.13%	-0.20%	-0.23%	-0.01%	-0.14%	-0.32%		-0.12%
CHF	-0.06%	-0.11%	-0.11%	0.09%	-0.03%	-0.20%	0.12%

The heat map shows percentage changes of major currencies against each other. The base currency is picked from the left column, while the quote currency is picked from the top row. For example, if you pick the US Dollar from the left column and move along the horizontal line to the Japanese Yen, the percentage change displayed in the box will represent USD (base)/JPY (quote).

What do US Job Opening figures mean for the US Dollar?

The US Dollar Index (DXY) jumped temporarily toward the 99.20 price zone following the release of US data, but trimmed some of these gains afterward. On the day, the DXY was broadly steady.

Why is the US Dollar broadly ignoring the upbeat employment data? The sharp increase in Job Openings signals a recovery in demand for workers, which is positive for the US economy and the US Dollar. However, the job openings data is a lagging indicator (the data refers to April), and markets tend to focus on more updated indicators.

Economic Indicator

JOLTS Job Openings

JOLTS Job Openings is a survey done by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics to help measure job vacancies. It collects data from employers including retailers, manufacturers and different offices each month.