Citi expects September payrolls to show strong growth of 240,000, partly reflecting a reversal of seasonal factors that led to a mere 105,000 increase in June. Average hourly earnings should rise 0.3 percent month-on-month in September, but risks to the upside could take the figure to 0.4 percent. That would reflect a rebound in wage growth after a modest slowdown in August.
The unemployment rate, meanwhile, is expected to fall back to 3.6% in September after an unexpected rise to 3.8% in August. The increase in the unemployment rate in August was largely due to an increase in the labor participation rate, which rose from 62.6 percent to 62.8 percent at that time.