Scotiabank Sees Small Employment Increases in Canada's December Report

08:25 AM EST, 12/31/2025 (MT Newswires) -- Canada will release its Labour Force Survey (LFS) for December on Jan. 9 at 8:30 a.m. ET, on the same day and time as the United States nonfarm payrolls (NFP), said Scotiabank.

A small gain of 10,000 with a slight uptick in the unemployment rate to 6.6% could emerge, predicted the bank.

Job growth has been running at a torrid pace over the past three months, with gains of over 50,000 month over month in each of them.

Seasonally adjusted (SA) job postings have been on fire, as marked by a steep upward trend since September that held in at high levels in December.

The Bank of Canada points to hiring intentions as a sign of weakness. According to Scotiabank, it should not. There in no real usefulness to hiring intentions as a tracker of trend job growth.

A further argument is that December is normally a seasonal down-month for employment, with the sole exception being last December, stated the bank. The pandemic and post-pandemic error have tended to employ lower than average SA factors for months of December, which may tamp down the estimated change in jobs.

The bank will also keep an eye on potential weather effects that may have to be considered for December and after. Flooding in British Columbia might be impactful. So may be the earlier and broader-than-normal flu season.

In any event, while it's a "noisy" LFS, Scotiabank cannot credibly dismiss the three strong consecutive gains, given the 95% confidence bands around their estimates would still have posted a positive trend and maybe even a much more positive one at that.

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