By Geoffrey Smith
Investing.com -- Job growth in the U.S. blew past expectations in January, the latest in a series of bewilderingly strong data from the labor market.
The Labor Department said nonfarm payrolls grew by 517,000 through the middle of the month, abruptly snapping a four-month trend of slowing job gains. Analysts had expected a further slowdown to 185,000, which would have been the slowest job growth in nearly two years.
December's data were also revised up to show a gain of 260,000 jobs, rather than the 223,000 originally reported.
The dollar gained over 0.5% in response, while stock futures fell as traders were forced to re-evaluate bets that an economic slowdown will force the Federal Reserve will cut interest rates later this year.
As is usual in January, the Bureau of Labor Statistics used updated statistics on the U.S. population to compile its data. This led to an upward revision of 871,000 in the civilian labor force, an 810,000 rise in employment and a 60,000 rise in unemployment. While the jobless rate was unaffected at a historically low 3.4% of the workforce, the labor force participation rate ticked up to 62.4% from 62.3%.