S&P/ASX 200 Index (ASX: XJO) investors are taking the latest Australian employment data in stride.
The benchmark index is down 0.3% during the Thursday lunch hour.
This comes following the October unemployment data, released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) at 11:30am AEDT.
The ASX 200 had been down around 0.2% for much of the morning prior to the release.
The slight uptick in unemployment in seasonally adjusted terms may help sway the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) to hold off on further interest rate hikes in its ongoing battle to bring inflation back to its 2% to 3% target range.
An end to the central bank's tightening cycle would benefit many stocks.
Though, judging by the muted reaction on the ASX 200, investors remain uncertain on that count.
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ASX 200 steadies on October jobs report
The ASX 200 is holding up well despite the fact the Aussie unemployment rate remains near historic lows, with the October rate coming in at 3.7%.
That's unchanged from September in trend terms, but up from 3.6% in seasonally adjusted terms.
"With employment increasing by 55,000 people, and the number of unemployed people increasing by 28,000, the unemployment rate rose to 3.7% in October," Bjorn Jarvis, ABS head of labour statistics said.
He noted that this puts the unemployment level back to where it was in July and August.
ASX 200 investors hoping for a bigger pullback in October following 20 months of tightening from the RBA will be left wanting. The RBA is forecasting the unemployment rate will edge up to 3.8% in December.
With the Aussie population swelling by some 35,000 people every month over the past year, Jarvis said the average employment growth over the past two months of around 31,000 people is coming in slightly lower.
And with more Australians engaged in work, the labour participation rate increased by 0.2% in October to 67%.
