Friday preview: August US non-farm payrolls, Gazprom in focus

The market spotlight at the end of the week was on the US non-farm payrolls report for August.

But it was possible that they would have to vie with Russian state-owned natural gas giant Gazprom and the Greenback for investors' attention.

Economists were anticipating a slowdown in hiring in the US from July's breakneck pace pf 528,000 to a still solid 300,000 during August.

Recent surveys for layoffs and unemployment claims had shown that they were holding at very low levels, multi-decade lows in the case of the former, while job openings were near record highs.

And hiring?

"On the heels of July’s blowout report, we look for payroll employment to begin to show some imprint of Fed tightening, with overall payroll gains slowing from 528k to 300k in August, and private payrolls decelerating from 471k to 275k," said economists at Barclays Research.

Complicating matters further, for traders in particular, were the inevitable complexities and unpredictability at times of seasonal adjustments and statistical quirks.

In any case, the reaction of interest rate markets and foreign exchange markets in response to the data might easily dominate the headlines over the following weekend - Gazprom permitting.

Indeed, across the Channel all eyes were likely to be on the announcement from Gazprom on whether or not reduced flows to Germany would resume following three days of routine maintenance to the Nordstream 1 pipeline.

That announcement was expected shortly after midnight.

In terms of data, at 1000 BST Eurostat was scheduled to release a reading for German producer prices in July.

Consensus was anticipating that the year-on-year rate of increase held at 35.8%.

No major economic reports were scheduled for release in the UK and Asia.

Friday 02 September

INTERIM DIVIDEND PAYMENT DATE

Avon Protection, Bellevue Healthcare Trust (Red), Inchcape, Just Group, Lancashire Holdings Limited, Moneysupermarket.com Group

QUARTERLY PAYMENT DATE

Honeywell International Inc., I3 Energy

INTERNATIONAL ECONOMIC ANNOUNCEMENTS

Balance of Trade (GER) (07:00)

Factory Orders (US) (15:00)

Non-Farm Payrolls (US) (13:30)

Producer Price Index (EU) (10:00)

Unemployment Rate (US) (13:30)

FINALS

Ashmore Group, Time Finance

FINAL DIVIDEND PAYMENT DATE

Cranswick, Heath (Samuel) & Sons, Iomart Group, Latham (James), New Century AIM VCT, NewRiver REIT

FINAL EX-DIVIDEND DATE

Base Resources Ltd