Canada employment dropped -17.3k, or -0.1% mom in May, worse than expectation of 21.2k growth. That compared to average 33k monthly growth from February to April. Employment was down -30k in the services-producing sector, and up 23k in the goods-producing sector.
Employment rate dropped -0.3% to 62.1%, reflecting strong population growth of 83k in the month.
Unemployment rate rose from 5.0% to 5.2%, above expectation of 5.1%. That’s the first monthly increase since August 2022.