Friday's Final Takeaways: U.S. Jobs Surge, TSLA Under Scrutiny, AAPL Set to Shine

**SPEAKER_1** (0:00)
Here's some final thoughts on today's session. We got the August jobs reports this morning. The US economy added 162,000 jobs in August. That far exceeded the expectations looking for about 53,000, and it marked the strongest monthly gain since March. The unemployment rate held steady at 4.1%.
The report also showed upward revisions to both June and July and broader based hiring, suggesting that the summer slowdown narrative in the labor market may be losing steam. Treasury yields jumped and stocks moved lower following the report with traders now putting about a 60% odds on a quarter point fed rate hike at the September meeting. But as we've been talking about next week's inflation data will be key, with fed officials already signaling that they could hold if inflation moderates or raise rates if it doesn't.
Tesla, another story that stood out to me, its long awaited Cybercab rollout facing a federal investigation just hours after the company put its first production robo taxis on public roads in Austin. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is examining how Tesla certified the roughly 1,000 Cybercabs as compliant with federal safety standards, despite the vehicles having no steering wheel or brake pedals. Tesla is relying on the industry's self-certification process rather than seeking an exemption, putting the company's regulatory strategy and its autonomous, its ambitious robo taxi expansion under the microscope. The investigation isn't just another hurdle for Tesla, it's also underscoring the broader challenge that's facing the robo taxi industry. Getting the driverless technologies onto the road is one thing, but proving that it can meet regulator safety requirements is another. As we head into next week, we do have a shortened trading week, no trading on Monday, but there is still quite a bit going on. We have a few more earnings left. We've got Oracle, Adobe, RH, Casey's General Stores, GameStop, Chewy, American Eagle, Macy's and Kroger to name a few. On the data front, we'll get consumer credit, existing home sales, the monthly treasury balance, as well as arguably the most important reports, PPI and CPI on Thursday and Friday. That new inflation data keenly in focus as it could impact the Fed's path forward at its meeting the following week. We also have Apple's Surprise and Shine event on Wednesday, September 9th. It will be John Ternus' first event as CEO, and the expectation is for a new iPhone 18 to be unveiled, along with that foldable iPhone, which is reportedly going to be called the iPhone Ultra.