GOOD MORNING. | | THE LEAD | Today is a rare kind of Friday. The Bureau of Labor Statistics released the March jobs report at 8:30 this morning, right on schedule. But the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq are both dark. Bond markets closed at noon. No traders are sitting at screens trying to react. The full market response will come Monday morning. | That gap matters for you. Whatever the March number shows, investors won't be able to act on it until Monday's opening bell. If the news is bad, any volatility is a long weekend away. If it is good, same story. Either way, Monday's open on April 6 could be interesting. | Here is what we know heading into the report. Economists expected the economy to add roughly 59,000 to 60,000 jobs in March, a modest rebound after February's surprising loss of 92,000 positions. That February number was the fourth monthly job loss in nine months, and it rattled confidence. | The Department of Energy's "Panic Buy" | | Every time hostilities flare up overseas, the Western energy grid shudders. | The U.S. government is tired of being held hostage by foreign supply chains. That's why Washington is officially dedicating $7B to boost the domestic supply of critical minerals. | They are throwing everything they have at securing lithium. | And one U.S. startup is perfectly positioned to capture the windfall. | Meet EnergyX. They earned a $5M grant from the Department of Energy to scale their operations. | Why them? Because EnergyX has patented tech that can recover up to 3X more lithium than conventional methods. | They now control nearly 150,000 acres of prime lithium territory across Chile and the US. A recent independent study projects their flagship Chilean project alone could generate $1.1B annually once fully operational, at projected market prices. | 40,000+ investors are already on board. | This reflects the significant progress we've made across our business, including: | Project Lonestar's Demonstration Plant commissioned in Texarkana, the largest DLE production plant in the U.S., now producing battery-grade lithium and validating GET-Lit™ at industrial scale At full production scale, Project Lonestar will produce up to 50,000 tons per year of Lithium. Based on current Lithium prices, the commercial plant will generate approximately $1billion a year in revenue.
| EnergyX's share price will increase from $12/share after April 16. | The FactSet consensus called for +57,000 nonfarm payrolls, which would represent a significant improvement from February's crater, though still far below the pre-tariff monthly average of roughly 180,000 jobs. | The biggest single factor expected to drive a rebound was healthcare. About 32,000 workers previously on strike at Starbucks and Kaiser Permanente returned to their jobs, which should have shown up in March payrolls. Excluding that statistical bounce, the underlying picture remains soft. | Last year, employers added an average of just 9,700 jobs a month, the weakest hiring outside a recession since 2002. Businesses have been reluctant to bring on new workers partly because of uncertainty arising from President Trump's trade and immigration policies. | Even the ADP private payrolls report this week, which came in at 62,000 and beat expectations, masked underlying weakness. Nearly all of the growth came from healthcare, which added 58,000 jobs. ADP's chief economist noted that these tend to be lower-paying home health aide positions, not the full-time, benefits-rich jobs that support household spending. |
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| For retirees, this matters because a weak labor market eventually touches everything. It pressures corporate earnings, which affects dividends. It pushes the Federal Reserve toward holding or cutting rates, which shapes what your savings and bonds return. Markets are currently pricing in no rate cuts from the Federal Reserve for the rest of the year, even though the Fed's own projections still show one reduction. | The practical takeaway today: do not make any financial moves based on headlines alone this weekend. The full picture, including market reaction and analyst interpretation, will not be clear until next week. | | | THE NUMBER THAT MATTERS | -92.000 | Interest Rate Fallout | That is how many nonfarm payroll jobs the economy lost in February, the number the March report needed to improve upon. It was the worst single-month loss in recent memory, and it made today's March release one of the most closely watched in years. Context matters here. The labor market has been in a low-hire, low-fire state for more than a year. Companies are reluctant to add workers, but they are also reluctant to lay anyone off. That sounds stable, but it quietly hurts younger workers and income-seekers. When fewer jobs are being created, wage pressure fades, and the economy grows more slowly. For anyone drawing income from a portfolio, slow growth is a headwind worth watching. |
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| | | WHAT WE'RE WATCHING THIS WEEK | INFLATION DATA | ENERGY: Oil Above $111 as Iran Conflict Drags On | Brent crude has risen roughly 50% since the U.S.-Israel war against Iran began in late February, though a weeklong pullback in oil prices earlier this week temporarily bolstered market sentiment. Thursday's partial rally came after Iran's state-run media reported that Iran and Oman are drafting a protocol to supervise traffic through the Strait of Hormuz. But the relief was short-lived. U.S. gasoline prices have risen more than 30% since the conflict began and have now crossed $4 per gallon nationally for the first time in more than three years. Higher fuel costs eat directly into retirees' budgets. They also push inflation higher, which complicates the Fed's path toward rate cuts. | | SMART MONEY SIGNAL | FEDERAL RESERVE: Fed Stays Cautious as Oil Stokes Inflation Worries | The yield on the 10-year Treasury note edged down to 4.31% Thursday, having traded as high as 4.38% earlier in the session, as reports of potential Strait of Hormuz coordination offered some relief. But volatility is expected to persist, with crude prices remaining near multi-year highs, fueling worries about an inflation spiral. St. Louis Federal Reserve President Alberto Musalem said this week that he believes the current policy rate appropriately balances the risks to the Fed's dual mandate and will likely remain appropriate for some time. For savers, that means the window for locking in higher yields on CDs and short-term Treasuries may still be open, but do not count on rates rising further. | | WORTH KNOWING | LABOR MARKET TREND: What a Slow Hiring Market Means for Long-Term Savers | The St. Louis Fed recently updated its research on what level of monthly job growth is needed to keep unemployment stable. Economists there now estimate the breakeven level could be as low as 15,000 jobs per month, down sharply from an estimate of 153,000 just a year ago. This reflects a smaller, slower-growing workforce. The current unemployment rate of 4.4% is only 0.2 percentage points above where it was a year ago despite the anemic payroll growth, with economists noting there is no clear sign of tipping into a recession. For income-focused investors, this is not a panic signal. It is a reason to hold diversified, quality positions and not stretch for yield in riskier corners of the market. | | | | | The March jobs report landed this morning on a closed market, which means the numbers sit in a kind of holding pattern until Monday. Any surprises from Friday's payrolls or fresh Iran headlines over the long weekend could jolt Wall Street right at Monday's open. If you have been thinking about rebalancing or adjusting income positions, let Monday's session settle before acting. Calm, steady, and patient is still the right posture here. |
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| *Disclaimer: This is a paid advertisement for EnergyX's Regulation A+ Offering. Please read the offering circular at invest.energyx.com. Under Regulation A+, a company has the ability to change its share price by up to 20%, without requalifying the offering with the SEC. |
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