Jane King from the New York Stock Exchange breaks down the latest labor report, AI’s mixed impact on jobs, oil market risks from geopolitical events, and the surge in AI-related IPO and chip valuations — all in one market snapshot. Learn why 172K new jobs matters, which sectors are seeing profit-taking, how trades and manufacturing may benefit, and what to watch next for IPOs and energy prices.
Jeffrey Snyder, Broadcast Retirement Network
Joining me now is Jane King from the New York Stock Exchange. Jane, always great to see you.
Thanks for making a few minutes for us this morning.
Jane King, Broadcast Journalist
Thank you, Jeff. Always good to be with you.
Jeffrey Snyder, Broadcast Retirement Network
We certainly appreciate it. We can see in the background the ballad, the halls of the New York Stock Exchange. I’m sure you have a lot of fun talking to the traders, talking to everybody, your colleagues in the press.
Jow’s report came out on Friday. I want to ask you about your thoughts about that. It seems like continuing to build momentum in terms of new jobs created.
Jane King, Broadcast Journalist
These jobs numbers keep coming out stronger than expected, and not by a little. So the U.S. added 172,000 jobs. That’s more than double expectations.
The unemployment rate‘s pretty stubborn, though. It’s still right around 4.3%, 4.4%. But even manufacturing added jobs last month. That was seen as a positive for that part of the economy.
But we’ve had, I believe, three months in a row now of job growth over 100,000. So they’ve consistently underestimated these, and that just shows. We’ve heard low hire, low fire job market, but it seems like there is some hiring going on out there.
Jeffrey Snyder, Broadcast Retirement Network
It does, and it’s good that they’re, in particular, manufacturing. I know the president’s economic agenda was to bring some of that back home to the United States, and I guess it’s working, by and large. Let me ask you about the unemployment number.
These are just pieces, I guess, for the audience, just to kind of set this up. This is all information that goes into a puzzle that people like yourself and traders all kind of figure out where things may or may not be going. But in terms of that unemployment number kind of stubbornly staying around 4%, is some of that maybe AI-related, and are those people finding jobs in other occupations as part of these job numbers that we’re seeing?
Jane King, Broadcast Journalist
It could be. I mean, we know there’s been job cuts due to AI. I mean, the tech industry alone in the month of May cut like 32,000 jobs as they were putting more money into artificial intelligence.
So we know it’s happening. There’s other companies who are spending money. Verizon is an example where they said, you know, this is going to change customer service representatives, but they are putting millions in to help train their customer service representatives to work with AI and to create AI agents.
So I think how AI is going to impact the economy and the job market still remains to be seen. Nobody really can figure this out yet, whether it’s going to be mass job loss, are we all going to figure it out and work alongside AI? How is this all going to work out?
But if you just look at these overall numbers, I mean, they’re not bad.
Jeffrey Snyder, Broadcast Retirement Network
No, they’re not bad. And I think that buoys kind of what we’re seeing indirectly in the stock market. But you know, one thing I’ve been seeing ads, one type of job that cannot be replaced by AI are the trades, carpenters, iron workers, engineers, right?
Those people, they are physically doing jobs. They may see a lot of opportunity. People coming into the trades may get a lot more opportunity.
Jane King, Broadcast Journalist
I think so. And they’re certainly making a lot of money. I mean, I was in Florida recently and it happened to be for the home show.
So I talked to a lot of people in construction and they were like, there’s just no way AI can do what a wood cutter could do and what an electrician can do. And they were like, these jobs for at least a generation, these are going to be some of the best, most high growth jobs out there.
Jeffrey Snyder, Broadcast Retirement Network
Yeah. And let’s, you know, I think both of us, and I think everyone understands that the pain that people feel when they lose their job, it could be as a result of AI, it could be for whatever reason and they have to transition. It’s a lot of stress, a lot of stress financially, a lot of stress personally, creates a lot of anxiety.
I think we’re both empathetic there. Let me ask you, going back to this geopolitical event in the Middle East, markets continue. I saw the other day, the S&P, the NASDAQ, the Dow Jones continue to climb the all-time highs, still having the impact on gas prices and oil, but the market just keeps on going, Jane.
Jane King, Broadcast Journalist
I know, I know. Well, and oil has kind of settled down. So it’s right around, you know, $90 a barrel or so.
So I think we got as high as like 120 or something during all this. Now we were around 70 before all this started. So we’re still elevated, but we’ve settled down, no big volatile moves.
And it’s almost like the market is just thinking this is going to get resolved at some point, but there is still a bit of a premium built in there.
Jeffrey Snyder, Broadcast Retirement Network
Yeah. And I guess, you know, I know you’re not an energy analyst, but you cover energy as part of your day-to-day, you know, you were on how many, I don’t even know how many networks you’re on, because you’re contributing to local and national networks. But I guess an area of concern that I have seen raised, and I want to ask you about this, is I think the Exxon CEO mentioned that, you know, because of the pull on U.S. demand or U.S. oil through the global economy, there may be some challenges with the oil supply. A lot of the countries have tapped into their strategic petroleum reserves. Any indication from your perspective and people that you talked to?
Jane King, Broadcast Journalist
Well, yeah, we did, of course, hear the Exxon CEO talking about, you know, this could really get ugly in a few months if this continues. And Patrick DeHaan with GasBuddy also kind of weighing in and saying gas prices could still go up even more because of this. But we’re just not seeing the market.
You know, when you hear a lot of mixed messages, my kind of go-to thing is, what’s the market telling me? Because that’s like a combination of a bunch of really well-informed people who have money on the line, in some cases a lot of money on the line. And I feel like that is one of the best indicators of what it is.
And the markets just don’t seem panicked about it. So I don’t know if they’re thinking there’s going to be a deal, the Strait of Hormuz is going to get opened up pretty soon, or if the U.S. has enough supply that, you know, we don’t have to worry about it or exactly what they’re doing. But there’s certainly no panic like there was back in February.
Jeffrey Snyder, Broadcast Retirement Network
Jane, given all the run-up in the markets, and it’s amazing to watch. And for those of us who have savings in IRAs and 401Ks and 403Bs, etc., it’s good to see and hopefully long-term it’ll do well. But let me ask you about an overheated situation, circumstance, because you and I both remember the go-go 90s.
Now, that was very different because there were balance sheets with literally no earnings. But are there concerns about an overheated market?
Jane King, Broadcast Journalist
For sure, especially in AI and particularly AI chips. Now, we did see toward the end of last week that kind of, you know, there was a pivot out of some of the, like Micron Technology, for example. I mean, it was worth like $200 billion a year ago.
It’s worth more than a trillion now. They make memory chips. We’ve seen, you know, other chip companies, just Marvell, and I’m trying to think of something, just parabolic.
And when you start to feel this FOMO feeling, that’s about when we’re at a top, I’ve learned. And we did see that Thursday, where, you know, some of the big money got out of those, took profits, put it in banks, healthcare, things like that, and looking for value in some other areas. So it doesn’t mean they can’t come back at some point, but that trade seems like it’s over for the time being.
Jeffrey Snyder, Broadcast Retirement Network
Wouldn’t they call that a sector rotation? Isn’t that what’s typically called in the asset management world?
Jane King, Broadcast Journalist
Maybe, I don’t know. I mean, I’ve just heard like, you know, yeah, rotation out of, you know, what’s been, and no doubt, those are profits there that some of those companies had percentage gains this year that you would not get in 10 to 15 years, in six months. And so any smart person with money was going to take some profits there and put it in to banks or something like that.
Jeffrey Snyder, Broadcast Retirement Network
Yeah. Sorry, I don’t mean to, I didn’t mean to interrupt you. Let me kind of close out with IPOs, initial public offerings.
Typically, or lately, I would say that there haven’t been a lot of IPOs, but I’ve been reading, and I want to get your sense about this, that some of the AI firms are thinking about going public. Your thoughts about the IPO?
Jane King, Broadcast Journalist
Well, Entropic did file the paperwork for that last week. And so that’s the beginning process. It was S1s that they have to file.
I think they’re targeting October for, of course, we’ve got SpaceX, June 12th, that’s going to be enormous. And then OpenAI is the other big one that people expect, although we don’t have any paperwork from them yet.
Jeffrey Snyder, Broadcast Retirement Network
So is that an indicator of itself that these companies, obviously, they have good earnings, I guess, that you would assume they have good earnings because they’re doing the IPO. But is this indicative of a broader positivity about, at least from institutions, about the economy and the stock market?
Jane King, Broadcast Journalist
Well, and I also think these companies want the capital raise from the IPO to build out their AI data centers. I mean, Elon Musk has talked about, he wants to go IPO so they can put data centers on the moon, for example. And that’s the only way he can get enough money to do that is to sell stock to the public.
So I think that’s part of it, too, is they’re just trying to raise the billions that they need to build out the tech infrastructure for AI.
Jeffrey Snyder, Broadcast Retirement Network
Yeah. Well, it’s really exciting. And I’m so glad that I get the opportunity to talk to you at least once a month because you are, you’re my mom’s favorite guest.
So Helen Snyder says hello. You’re really wonderful. We appreciate your time.
And look, we look forward to having you back again very soon, Jane.
Jane King, Broadcast Journalist
Okay. Talk to you then. Bye.