It appears the 'strongest labor market ever' is showing signs of stress as the number of Americans seeking first-time jobless benefits surged to 218k last week - its highest since mid-January...

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Source: Bloomberg

This is the biggest 8-week rise in jobless claims since the growth scare in Dec 2020/Jan 2021... and no this is not seasonal...

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Kentucky, California, and Pennsylvania dominated the rise in jobless claims...

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This labor market pain echoes weakness seen in recent survey data - such as ISM Manufacturing and Empire Fed and this morning we saw Philly Fed's Business Outlook survey plunge from 17.6 to 2.6 (massively missing expectations of 15.0).

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That is the weakest since June 2020... with Employment and the outlook sliding...

• May prices paid fell to 78.9 vs 84.6

• New orders rose to 22.1 vs 17.8

• Employment fell to 25.5 vs 41.4

• Shipments rose to 35.3 vs 19.1

• Delivery time fell to 17.5 vs 17.9

• Inventories fell to 3.2 vs 11.9

• Prices received fell to 51.7 vs 55.0

• Unfilled orders rose to 17.9 vs 5.7

• The average workweek fell to 16.1 vs 20.8

• Six-month outlook fell to 2.5 vs 8.2

• The six-month outlook for capex fell to 9.6 vs 19.9

So sentiment is slumping, financial conditions are tightening (at their tightest since Dec 2018's flip-flop), and now the jobs market is floundering.

And The Fed has 10 more rate hikes to go this year?!