U.S. Labor Department said to acknowledge technical glitch in release of jobs report

The U.S. Department of Labor acknowledged that a technical glitch delayed the release of important payroll data last week, according to a Wednesday media report.

Recall the preliminary estimate for the payrolls benchmark, which was due out on Aug. 21 at 10:00 a.m. ET, was delayed by about a half-hour. The revision wiped out 818K jobs in the 12 months through March 2024 (or 68,000 per month), resulting in the biggest downward adjustment since the global financial crisis.

A spokesperson for the Labor Department also acknowledged staff provided the crucial payroll figures to callers before the release was made public, Bloomberg reported.

Mizuho (MFG), BNP Paribas (OTCQX:BNPQF) and Nomura’s (NMR) economic research team all called the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the DOL agency responsible for releasing certain economic reports such as jobs and inflation readings, and received the number directly. The rest of Wall Street was left waiting for another ~30 minutes.

As such, the BLS will ensure that each data release is distributed through multiple channels including social media, moving forward, the spokesperson told Bloomberg.