NFP and gold: trading the jobs report

Non-Farm Payrolls (NFP) counts the jobs added in the US last month. It comes out with the unemployment rate and average hourly earnings, usually on the first Friday of the month at 8:30am New York time, and it’s one of gold’s most volatile moments.

How gold reacts

• Jobs well above forecast: the economy looks strong, rate cuts look further away, the dollar rises, and gold usually falls.
• Jobs well below forecast: the economy looks weak, cuts look closer, the dollar falls, and gold usually rises.

Three details often move the price as much as the headline:

1. Revisions to previous months can cancel out the headline number.
2. Unemployment rate: a rising rate supports gold.
3. Average hourly earnings: hot wage growth means inflation pressure, which is bad for gold on the day.

What it’s like to trade

In the first seconds gold can swing $10 to $30 in both directions, spreads blow out, and stop losses can fill well past their level. The first move often reverses.

A sensible NFP routine

1. Mark it in the economic calendar.
2. Close or reduce trades you don’t want exposed, or move stops to entry.
3. Don’t open new trades in the 15 minutes before.
4. After the release, wait for spreads to normalise and a clear direction before acting on new signals.