When will Australia's labour force data be released and how could it affect AUD/USD?

Aussie labour force overview

Today, we have Australia's labour force data that will be released at 01:30 GMT. 

Labour market conditions for the RBA are a key component towards making their interest rate decisions. In the last meeting, where the RBA left rates on hold at 1.50% at its July meeting. On labour market conditions, the Bank's statement removed last month’s observation that “growth in hours worked remains weak”. This aspect of the report today will be crucial for markets, as negative real wage growth in the economy would hinder the Aussie because the RBA’s growth outlook will likely be revised lower for August's meeting. 

Additionally, analysts at Nomura explained that the Australian economic data surprise index is currently at fairly elevated levels and historically this has not tended to last. "On this front, we would note that monthly employment growth in Australia has exceeded market expectations in six of the past seven months. Even though the forward-looking indicators point to further job gains over coming months, this type of positive run in the volatile Australian labour market series, particularly to the extent recently observed, seldom lasts without a pause," argued the analysts at Nomura. 

Analysts at ANZ expect a 20k lift in employment and for the unemployment rate to be stable at 5.5%, "that certainly doesn’t sound bad, especially with 140k jobs already created over the prior three months, but with market expectations ratcheting up too, we suspect there is a decent hurdle to generate upside AUD surprises."

How could Aussie jobs affect AUD/USD?

AUD/USD is ripe for a correction on a disappointment in today's data, already at weekly highs and running out of steam ahead of the data, capped at 0.7959 in the US session. 0.7901 is the 18th July low and 0.7750 would be a key support area thereafter. On a break of the 0.8000/30 region, however, 0.8160 on the wide is a key target area being the 2nd of May 2015 high and the mid level of the Dec 2014 congestion area between 0.8032 and 0.8295.

Key notes:

• RBA: bullish but on hold for time being? - UOB
• AUD on a tear, will it extend? - ANZ
• AUD/USD intermarket: risk on, headed for the 0.80 multi-year high resistance?
• AUD/USD analysis: bullish stance persists ahead of employment data

About the Australian unemployment rate

The Unemployment Rate released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics is the number of unemployed workers divided by the total civilian labour force. If the rate hikes, this indicates a lack of expansion within the Australian labour market. As a result, a rise leads to a weakening of the Australian economy. A decrease of the figure is seen as positive (or bullish) for the AUD, while an increase is seen as negative (or bearish).