Following a surprise increase in mortgage industry headcount, monthly employment retreated. But employment strengthened across all U.S. industries — likely putting an end to plunging mortgage rates for the time being.
The disappointing mortgage-sector news came Friday from the Department of Labor.
During June, the number of people working in real estate finance was 239,100. That was down from 241,500 mortgage jobs reported for May — when mortgage employment expanded by 2,600.
The data, which is provided by the Labor Department’s Bureau of Labor Statistics, indicated that a revised 256,900 were employed in the sector during June 2010.
Zeroing in on positions in “real estate credit,” the count declined by a thousand from May to 190,500.
“Mortgage and nonmortgage loan brokers” fell to 48,600 in June from 50,400 a month earlier.
But the news was better for the country’s employment situation as a whole.
The U.S. unemployment rate improved to 9.1 percent in July from June’s 9.2 percent. The decline in the country’s jobless rate was even bigger when compared to the 9.5 percent previously reported for July 2010.
The lower unemployment rate is already reversing the negative momentum that had been building in the stock market, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average — which plummeted more than 500 on Thursday — opening nearly a hundred points higher.
However, it also means that record-low mortgage rates that accompanied the Treasury bond rally as investors sought a flight to quality will likely rise.
In early trading, the yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury note was 2.51 percent, climbing from 2.47 percent at the close of trading yesterday, according to data from the Department of the Treasury and WSJ.com.
But downward pressure on rates remains as investors grapple with the European sovereign debt crisis and a still-ailing U.S. economy.
Nonfarm payrolls increased by 117,000 jobs in July, the bureau reported, nearly 10 times the increase previously reported for June.
