● March US job openings decline to 4.99 million | MarketWatch
● US Retail Sales Flat in 1st Week of May From April: Redbook | Nasdaq
● US Small-Business Owners Were More Upbeat and Ready to Hire in April | WSJ
● Eurozone Q1 GDP Growth Picks Up | RTT
● German economy slows more than expected in Q1 as trade drags | Reuters
● French Q1 GDP increased strongly: +0.6% after 0.0% | Insee
● Eurozone industrial production decelerated in March | FT

US retail sales are expected to rise 0.2% in tomorrow’s April report vs. the previous month, according to The Capital Spectator’s median point forecast for several econometric estimates. The median prediction reflects a substantial deceleration in growth vs. the previous month’s 0.9% advance. Recent surveys of economists also project a considerably lesser rate of growth for retail spending in April.
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US payrolls bounced back in April, rising a solid 223,000 after March’s dismal gain of just 85,000. The news cheered the crowd and renewed faith in the case for macro optimism. But if the second-quarter is on the path of recovery after a rough winter, it’s not obvious in the Federal Reserve’s 19-factor Labor Market Conditions Index (LMCI), which ticked lower again in April and posted its second-consecutive negative reading.
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● Fed’s Labor Market Conditions Index At 3-Year Low In April | Action Forex
● Conference Board Employment Trends Index Ticks Up in April | CB
● U.K. Industrial Output Unexpectedly Rises Most in 6 Months | Bloomberg
● Fed’s Dudley: Interest Rate Increases Will Mark Regime Shift | Bloomberg
● No respite in sell-off of low-risk bonds | Reuters
● Bank of France: French economy will grow 0.3% in Q2 | RTT

Buy on the rumor, sell on the news. That ancient bit of trading advice seems to describe last week’s data for Treasury yields. In the days leading up to Friday’s report on payrolls for April, the benchmark 10-year yield increased to a new year-to-date high on Wednesday, only to slump when the better-than-expected jobs report arrived. The conventional wisdom interprets April’s solid job gains as a convincing signal that the economy is rebounding after a weak first quarter. In turn, the upbeat outlook has renewed forecasts that the Fed will lift interest rates later this year. Maybe, although the Treasury market seems to be having second thoughts… again.
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● US job gains accelerate but wage growth is meager | LA Times
● GDPNow forecast of US Q2 growth (as of May 5): +0.8% | Atlanta Fed
● Euro zone set to report solid growth, for a change | Reuters
● China Cuts Interest Rates as Economic Growth Slows | WSJ
● Greece Readies for Another Week of Deadlines | Bloomberg

● Rise of the Robots: Technology and the Threat of a Jobless Future
By Martin Ford
Review via FT
Martin Ford has seen the future, and it doesn’t work. To be more precise, it generates wealth while obliterating demand for work. “Go West, young man”, was the career advice of the 19th century. Today’s equivalent is “get an engineering degree”. Alas, the latter is not as rewarding as the former. A third of Americans who graduated in STEM subjects (science, technology, engineering and maths) are in jobs that do not require any such degree. Up and down the US there are programmers working as fast-food servers. In the age of artificial intelligence, they will only drift further into obsolescence, says Ford.
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The private sector added 213,000 jobs in April, delivering a hefty gain after a disturbingly soft rise in March, the Labor Department reports. Indeed, the government’s revised data for March shows that US companies increased payrolls by only 94,000, substantially less than the initial estimate of a 129,000 rise. The main takeaway, however, is obvious: job creation picked up dramatically last month. The news suggests that the sharp slowdown in March was an anomaly. As for deciding whether the economy is again headed for a period of modest growth or something stronger, today’s data still leaves room for debate.
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Every time someone comes up with a “new and improved” way to invest or predict which active managers will shine, it seems that subsequent research finds that it’s really just about focusing on different betas. The latest example is a new study (“Deactivating Active Share”) from AQR, a quantitative money manager, which documents that it’s (still) all about beta when it comes to looking for clues about which active managers are more likely to deliver statistically significant alpha.
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● UK election: David Cameron’s Conservative Party predicted to win majority | CNN
● US jobless claims hover near 15-year low, boost growth outlook | Reuters
● Consumer Comfort in U.S. Declines to Lowest Level in 8 Weeks | Bloomberg
● Consumer credit jumps $20.5 billion in March | MarketWatch
● German Industrial Production Falls as Economy Risks Grow | Bloomberg
● German Exports Rise More Than Forecast | RTT
● China April Trade Disappoints; Govt Warns of Unstable Exports | MNI
● Italy Industrial Production Climbs More Than Expected | RTT
● MNI Survey: Japan Q1 GDP +1.6% Annualized, 2nd Straight Rise | MNI