Today’s jobs report shows that federal government employment declined by 10,000 in February.

That could that be an early impact of Elon Musk’s DOGE programme, which has led to layoffs at a number of US federal agencies in recent weeks

NEWSFLASH: Hiring across the US economy picked up slightly at the start of Donald Trump’s second term in office.

The US economy added 151,000 new jobs in February, the latest non-farm payroll report shows, slightly below the 160,000 expected by economists.

But that’s a pick-up compared to January – payroll growth that month has been revised down to 125,000, from 143,000 first reporter.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports:

Employment trended up in health care, financial activities, transportation and warehousing, and social assistance. Federal government employment declined.

Tensions is building in the financial markets as investors await the latest US jobs report.

February’s non-farm payroll (NFP) – covering the first full month of Donald Trump’s second presidency – is expected to show a rise in employment. The data is due at 1.30pm UK time, or 8.30am on the east coast.

Wall Street economists predict the NFP rose by 160,000 in February, up from a 143,000 increase in January.

But, there are fears that Elon Musk’s push to reduce the size of the government and to cut government spending through his Doge initiative could be weakening the labour market.

Earlier this week, a survey of private sector payroll growth was much weaker than expected – with hiring slowing to just 77,000 new jobs last month.

The strength of the US jobs market is a crucial factor determining how quickly the Federal Reserve cuts interest rates this year.

We’ll also get an updated unemployment rate reading, and estimates of how much wages rose last month.

Stephen Innes, managing partner at SPI Asset Management, says:

The consensus for today’s NFP print sits at +160K jobs, with unemployment steady at 4%, and wage growth holding at 4% YoY.

A negative surprise could send the dollar tumbling, especially after this week’s policy-driven repricing across markets.

The rising cost of sugar, dairy and vegetable oil pushed up global food commodity prices in February, the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) reported today.

The FAO Food Price Index, which tracks a basket of food commodities, rose by 1.6% in February. While the meat price index remained stable, all other price indices rose, with the most significant increases recorded for sugar, dairy and vegetable oils, the FAO says.

Sugar prices jumped by 6.6% in the month, due to concerns over tighter global supplies in the 2024/25 season.

The FAO explains:

Declining production prospects in India and concerns over the impact of recent dry weather on the upcoming crop in Brazil, which exacerbated the seasonal effect, underpinned the increase in prices. Additionally, the strengthening of the Brazilian real against the United States dollar, which tends to affect exports from Brazil, further contributed to the overall increase in global sugar prices.

The Vegetable Oil Price Index rose 2%, driven by higher prices for palm, rapeseed, soy and sunflower oils.

The report says:

After a brief decline in January, international palm oil prices rebounded moderately and maintained their premiums over competing oils. The increase was largely underpinned by seasonally lower outputs in Southeast Asian producing countries and expectations of increased demand from the biodiesel industry in Indonesia.

Dairy prices rose by 4%, driven by higher prices across all major dairy products.

According to the FAO:

International cheese prices increased for the third consecutive month, rising by 4.7 percent from January. The rise was fueled by strong import demand, as recovering production in Europe was offset by seasonal output declines in Oceania.

U.S. President Donald Trump said U.S. tariffs could go up over time but gave no other details, according to an excerpt of a Fox Business interview taped on Thursday that aired on Friday, Reuters reports.

Asked whether businesses could get clarity about his tariff plan, Trump said:

“Well, I think so. But, you know, the terms could go up as time goes by, and they may go up and, you know, I don’t know if it’s predictability.”

(One can assuse Trump of many things, but predictability would not be at the top of the list)

After a seismic week for the future of Europe, the euro is on track for its best week since the financial crisis 16 years ago.

The euro has climbed by 4.6% so far this week against the US dollar, from $1.0375 a week ago to $1.086 today.

That would be its biggest gain, in percentage terms, since the week to 20 March 2009, when the financial markets were being rattled by the recession following the global financial crisis.

In value terms, it’s on track to be the sixth best week in at least the last 20 years.

This week, the euro has benefitted from the slide in the value of the US dollar as Donald Trumps’s threatened trade wars hurt the US currency.

But the euro has also gained against sterling, up to 83.95p, from 82.46p a week ago.

“The euro continues to benefit from the apparent change in the eurozone’s fiscal stance,” says Achilleas Georgolopoulos, senior market analyst at Trading Point.

There was a fiscal sea change in Germany this week, where major parties are pushing plans to reform the country’s debt brake, to allow for higher defense spending.

Last night, European leaders agreed to a massive increase to defence spending, to bolster Europe’s defence industry and increase its military capability.

There’s significant disruption to Eurostar services today, after an suspected unexploded bomb from the second world war was found on railway tracks in the commune of Saint Denis.

Eurostar has just confirmed to the Guardian that “all Eurostar trains are cancelled to and from Paris today.”

That includes all services on lines: London-Paris, Paris-London, Brussels-Paris and Paris-Brussels.

Our Europe live blog has all the action: