ADP Logs Surprise 33,000 Job Drop 

Hiring hit the brakes in June, with the ADP National Employment Report showing U.S. private-sector payrolls shrinking by 33,000 positions—the first monthly contraction of 2025. Goods makers managed to eke out modest gains, but service industries bled jobs, and small businesses took the biggest hit. Wages, meanwhile, kept climbing faster than the official inflation gauges, hinting that the Federal Reserve’s long-promised “soft landing” is still more wish than reality. Against that backdrop of economic wobble and sticky pay growth, spot gold briefly touched $3,359 an ounce on Wednesday, not far from its all-time high.

The sector split was stark. Professional and business services shed 56,000 positions, and education and health services lost another 52,000. Those losses dwarfed the 32,000 hires in leisure and hospitality and the 15,000 additions in manufacturing. Overall, goods-producing industries created 32,000 jobs, but service-providers cut 66,000, underscoring a cooling demand for white-collar labor even as factory floors stay relatively busy. “Though layoffs continue to be rare, a hesitancy to hire and a reluctance to replace departing workers led to job losses last month,” cautioned ADP chief economist Dr. Nela Richardson.

Source: ADP Research