Australian unemployment down in April

Australian labour market improved significantly last month, undermining central bank's efforts to relieve pressure on manufacturers and exporters. The Australian Bureau of Statistics said jobless rate stood at 5.5% in April, down from 5.6% in the preceding month, outdoing analyst forecasts that unemployment would hold steady. The economy added 50,100 new jobs, a figure well ahead of the 12,000 consensus. The nation's mining sector, which accounts around 10% of Australian job market, shed thousands of workers last year, weighing on the economic output. 

"Unemployment in Western Australia is now at its highest level since mid-2010," said Tom Kennedy, a Sydney-based economist at JPMorgan. "That jobless rate has been trending higher, and it may suggest that some kind of rebalancing in the labor market is occurring."

"Reserve Bank Board members probably winced when they heard the job numbers," said Craig James, a senior economist at a unit of Commonwealth Bank of Australia, the nation's biggest lender. "The Reserve Bank will probably leave a rate cut on the table over the next few months. But more figures like this and it clearly won't be acting on the easing bias."