With all due respect to Sydney Harbour, the US economy closed out 2024 with the most spectacular fireworks display of them all. Employers added 256,000 jobs in December, smashing expectations of 155k jobs, per the Labor Department’s monthly report released yesterday. For the cherry on top, the unemployment rate fell to 4.1%, which was also better than projections.

The results point to a strong employment situation in the US that may even be picking up steam.

That’s a wrap on jobs numbers for the full year: And nothing could stop one of the most thriving labor markets in US history. The economy created 2.2 million jobs in 2024, more than the 2 million added before the pandemic in 2019.

Hiring was positive for every month of the year—in fact, December marked the 48th consecutive month of net job creation, tied for the second-longest streak on record. You have to go all the way back to December 2020 for the last month the economy lost jobs.

This probably puts Fed rate cuts on ice

Because of this blockbuster report, more interest-rate cuts appear as distant as GTA VI in the fall. Remember, the Fed slashed rates three times last year to prop up the labor market. But now, the labor market doesn’t need any help—it just got an A+ report card. Analysts now expect Fed Chair Jerome Powell to hold rates steady for the foreseeable future, especially as inflation has stalled out at above-normal levels.

That’s sent bond yields soaring around the globe in recent weeks. And they continued their upward march yesterday after the jobs report came out (yields climb when investors dump bonds). The 10-year US Treasury yield, the benchmark for borrowing costs across the economy, spiked to its highest level since late 2023. Across the pond, UK bond yields reached their highest levels since 1998 this week.

Rising yields have a number of consequences, many of which are not helpful:

• Despite the blowout jobs report, stocks fell yesterday, and that’s because the lure of higher returns on bonds makes stocks less attractive to investors.
• Don’t expect the frozen housing market to thaw out. Mortgage rates track the 10-year yield, and they hit their highest level since July this week, with the 30-year fixed-rate mortgage once again bumping up against 7%.

Looking ahead…the job market is set up for another banner year. In a LinkedIn survey of 2,000 C-suite execs, 77% said they’re preparing for steady or high-growth hiring in 2025.—NF

Donald Trump was sentenced…to zero punishment for his conviction on 34 counts of falsifying business records to conceal hush money payments to adult film star Stormy Daniels. Yesterday, he made a brief video appearance in a NY courtroom to face a judge who sentenced him to an unconditional discharge, an atypical but widely anticipated outcome of the criminal case getting closed with no jail time or fine. Trump maintained his innocence, calling the sentencing a “despicable” event and promising to appeal the decision. The no-penalty sentence means that Trump’s felony conviction does not preclude him from voting in his home state of Florida, though he is barred from owning a gun under federal law and must now provide a DNA sample to NY State’s crime database.

Hottest. Year. Ever. 2024 was the hottest year since record-keeping began, topping the previous record from 2023, Europe’s Copernicus Climate Change Service announced. Last year also marked the first time that average temps exceeded the threshold of 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels that were set by the Paris Climate Agreement, intended to keep climate change in check (this doesn’t mean the milestone was officially breached, since Paris uses longer-term trends rather than a single year). The last 10 years have been the 10 hottest on record, Copernicus said, attributing the warming overwhelmingly to humanity’s burning of fossil fuels that release heat-trapping greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere.

JPMorgan Chase is bringing everyone back to the office. The working-from-home-with-your-dog days are over for most of the ~300,000 workers who call Jamie Dimon papa. Hybrid employees at America’s largest bank will be asked to return to in-person work five days a week beginning in March, JPMorgan announced yesterday in an internal memo. More than half of the bank’s staff had already RTO’d. Pretty much everyone else is about to get a 30-day heads up before they’re required to show full-time face, with limited exceptions for teams doing work that “can be easily and clearly measured.” NYC-based employees who’ve been IRL-reluctant have the Manhattan office’s bougie food hall, meditation and yoga spaces, and cycling rooms to look forward to.

Firefighters made some progress combatting the multiple wildfires burning around Los Angeles during a respite from high winds yesterday. At least 10 people have died and over 36,000 acres have been burned—an area bigger than the size of San Francisco or Miami.

Here are the latest updates, key questions, and info on where to donate to help you keep tabs on what’s going on and to help those impacted:

Track the fires through maps.

The city has implemented a curfew in impacted areas to crack down on looters.

Two false evacuation notices freaked out residents unnecessarily.

Why did Los Angeles firefighters run out of water while fighting the blazes?

The fires have left thousands of people searching for temporary housing.

Why are nearly 800 inmates being deployed to fight the California fires?

How one app became the go-to source for information on the fires.

Here’s the status of Los Angeles’s famous landmarks.

A compilation of images from the fires, showcasing both destruction and heroism.

Donate to the American Red Cross or a host of other organizations helping affected communities.

Imagine losing your life savings from a middle seat. At CES this week, Delta Air Lines announced a partnership with the sportsbook DraftKings—but your imagination will have to take it from there, because no other details were revealed.

Gambling on commercial flights has been illegal in the US since 1962, but there have been attempts to change the law over the last few decades. In 1991, US-registered cruise ships secured gambling rights, and a few smaller airlines such as Northwest Airlines and TWA attempted unsuccessfully to use the momentum to bring betting aboard their flights.

• Singapore Airlines attempted to put physical slot machines on a flight in 1981. It was popular, but the machines kept breaking.
• Ryanair and Richard Branson’s Virgin Atlantic briefly floated in-flight gambling.

Big picture: The partnership will likely manifest in less flashy in-flight games or SkyMile/sports-betting deals for the time being. But there’s a lot of potential revenue in a future where parlays can be made while the seatbelt sign is on. A Department of Transportation study from 1996 found airlines could make more than $1 million per aircraft every year if they offered gambling, the equivalent of well over $1.3 billion annually (in today’s dollars) for an airline the size of Delta.—MM

As more iPad tip screens get swung in their face, American consumers are pushing back.

The average tip at full-service restaurants in the US hit its lowest level in six years, declining to 19.3% for the three months that ended Sept. 30, according to Toast. It’s a sign that rising menu prices, the proliferation of mandatory service fees, and being prompted to tip in historically tip-free venues has Americans becoming stingier over gratuities, the WSJ reports.

Tipping peaked in 2021, when sympathy abounded for service workers who weren’t allowed to shack up in a home office. The average tip at a sit-down restaurant hit 19.9%, while more than half of consumers said they tipped 20% or more, per restaurant tech company Popmenu. Last year, just 38% did.—NF