Stocks tumbled Friday after President Donald Trump and the first lady tested positive for the coronavirus and the U.S. added fewer jobs in September than forecasts predicted.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average barely rose 0.02%, to 27,794, the S&P 500 declined 0.62% and the Nasdaq dropped 1.92%.
TheStreet’s Katherine Ross discussed breaking news in the stock market on Street Lightning. Cramer spoke about job recovery in the U.S., the stimulus package and Amazon.
Jobs Recovery Past Forgiveness Period
U.S. employers added fewer-than-expected new jobs last month, data from the Labor Department confirmed Friday, as hiring slowed sharply from August amid new layoffs and a broader economic slowdown linked to the coronavirus pandemic.
The net new job total rose by 661,000 and the unemployment rate was at 7.9%. Economists surveyed by Dow Jones had been expecting a payroll gain of 800,000 and the unemployment rate to fall to 8.2% from 8.4% in August, CNBC reported.
Cramer said these numbers are a recognition that we are through the forgiveness period. Cramer added that we are now going to see a mixture of people being hired by Amazon, Walmart and Costco along with those who lost their jobs for no reason like a waiter, bartender, etc.
Stimulus Package May Find a Path
Cramer said Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin is under no instructions to give a deal. The deal that Speaker Pelosi wants includes massive aids for the states. President Trump has historically not offered a deal that gives states that he regards as being on the enemy list any help, Cramer added. “That’s a big sticking point,” he said.
Amazon Stock: Buy or Sell?
E-commerce giant Amazon (AMZN) – Get Report said late Thursday that 19,816 of its front-line U.S. employees at Amazon and Whole Foods have tested positive or been presumed positive for the coronavirus.
In a blog post, the company said it did a “thorough analysis of data on all 1,372,000 Amazon and Whole Foods Market front-line employees across the US employed at any time from March 1 to September 19, 2020.”
Amazon has in the past resisted making public data on the total number of confirmed coronavirus cases at its warehouses, which have become crucial hubs for household supplies being shipped to online shoppers during the pandemic.
Cramer said Amazon put out these numbers maybe because they’ve got the virus under control.