The U.S. nonfarm payroll report was a huge surprise and a complete disconnect from just about everything we saw regarding the U.S. labour market in November. This is not to suggest that the pace of decline in employment is failing to subside, but rather the magnitude of the improvement in the so called second derivative. There was absolutely nothing in the i) claims data, ii) ISM manufacturing data, iii) ISM non-manufacturing data, iv) ADP report, and v) Challenger hiring and firing data that would have pointed to the direction of such a small decline in nonfarm payrolls (-11,000 in November).