Less Help Wanted: Sign of Trouble for Labor Market?

Nvidia is set to report quarterly results tomorrow. We bet that the company won't disappoint unless it announces that its highly anticipated Blackwell chip isn't quite ready for primetime. A CNBC headline trumpeted today that Nvidia is the world's "most important stock." It certainly has had an amazing run as its revenues have soared and so has its forward profit margin, currently at 56.1% (chart). (See our Nvidia chart book.) Nvidia could lead the S&P 500 to a new record high by the end of this week.

Today's consumer confidence survey report for August is the second indication of that month's labor market conditions. The first indication has been the past two weekly initial unemployment claims reports. Some observers would say these indicators confirm that the labor market is "cooling," just as Fed Chair Jerome Powell said this past Friday. We think they confirm that it is simply normalizing. Let's have a look at these indicators as well as August's regional business survey reports and July's durable goods release: