Nuveen Chief Investment Officer Saira Malik went on CNBC Friday and said a soft September payroll number is good news for investors: “Payrolls missing expectations are a relief for the markets because markets have been focused on two headwinds. Number one, is the FOMC going to raise rates in October? And number two, this consistent march higher of Treasury yields. I think this takes a rate hike off the table, which will be a positive for the markets.”, according to Nuveen
The first challenge is the risk of more Federal Reserve tightening at the October Federal Open Market Committee meeting. The second is the steady rise at the long end of the Treasury curve. After the report, traders now see little chance of a Fed rate hike in October, according to CNBC.
Ten-Year Yield Sits at Its Highest Level in a Year
The ten-year Treasury yield settled at 5.29% on September 30, 2026, the latest reading in the St. Louis Fed’s ten-year Treasury series. It was the highest ten-year yield in the trailing year, at the 99.6 percent of the past year’s range.
One soft report that cools hike expectations gives stock investors room to breathe, though a yield at a one-year high still signals an intact upward trend.
Stocks Move Higher After the Report
The broad market is up. The SPDR S&P 500 ETF (NYSEARCA:SPY) traded at $770.85 as of 11:02 AM ET on October 2, 2026, up 0.90% in the session. The fund is up 13.04% year to date and up 15.32% over the past year.
Dissent: Good for Markets, Hard on Households
Kitty Richards, a senior fellow at Groundwork Collaborative and a former Treasury Department official, offered a sharp response: “The good news for the market has become decoupled from good news for working families. Unemployment is ticking up slightly, but it’s not delivering wage gains that keep up with inflation. Families are getting squeezed.”, according to Groundwork Collaborative
The latest official data has the unemployment rate at 4.1% for August 2026 and average hourly earnings for private employees at $37.75 that same month. The broadcast reported September unemployment at 4.2% and year-over-year wage growth at 3%.
Counterpoint: Output Keeps Expanding
Peter Earle, research director at the American Institute for Economic Research, pointed to output: “We’ve got an economy that’s expanding robustly, despite subdued hiring. The most recent real GDP was the greatest outside of the pandemic recovery since 2006.”
The CNBC host also pushed back on the gloom: “You look at the unemployment rate, 4.2%. And considering the labor supply that’s been talked about, it’s hard to look at this economy and think wow, this is an economy that is not working.”, according to CNBC
One Report, Three Different Economies
All three speakers looked at the same report and described different economies. Markets care about the policy path. Households care about purchasing power. Economists care about output. A soft payroll number can help stock valuations, mean little for growth, and hurt a worker whose raise doesn’t cover rising costs, all at once.
Is a Weak Jobs Report Good News?
For stock investors, the answer is yes in the near term, because it eases both challenge Malik named. For workers, it depends on whether pay is keeping up with costs. Watch whether the ten-year yield breaks its upward trend, what the Federal Open Market Committee signals at its October meeting, and whether the next wage and inflation reports settle the debate between Richards and her critics.