Private payrolls rose 41,000 in December, slightly below expectations

ADP reported private payrolls rose by 41,000 in December, below the Dow Jones consensus of 48,000; gains were concentrated in services, led by education and health and leisure and hospitality.

ADP reported that private sector payrolls rose by 41,000 in December, reversing a revised November loss of 29,000. The December total was slightly below the Dow Jones consensus estimate of 48,000. Most of the hiring occurred in services industries, while some professional and information sectors lost jobs. The report arrives two days before the federal government's nonfarm payrolls release, which was delayed earlier by a government shutdown. Key details: - Private payrolls increased by 41,000 in December; November was revised to a 29,000 loss from an earlier 32,000 figure. - The Dow Jones consensus for private payrolls was 48,000 for December. - Services led gains: education and health added 39,000 jobs and leisure and hospitality added 24,000; trade, transportation and utilities added 11,000 and financial services added 6,000. - Losses included professional and business services (-29,000), information (-12,000), and manufacturing (-5,000); goods-producing industries fell by 3,000. - Wage growth remained tempered: those staying in their jobs saw a 4.4% annual increase, unchanged from November, while job changers saw 6.6% annual gains, up 0.3 percentage point from the prior month. - Nearly all job gains were at firms with fewer than 500 employees; large employers added about 2,000 jobs. Summary: The ADP report indicates private-sector hiring turned positive at year-end but at a softer pace than some forecasts, with small firms and service sectors accounting for most of the gains. Official nonfarm payrolls data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics are due in two days and will be the first on-time release since the recent government shutdown; economists surveyed by Dow Jones expect about 73,000 new jobs and an unemployment rate around 4.5%.