Source: The Canadian Press

Stock markets headed for a flat open Friday as investors took in signs that job creation is picking up the pace in the U.S. private sector.

The U.S. Labour Department reported that overall, the economy shed 95,000 jobs while the unemployment rate was unchanged at 9.6%.

Government employment fell by 159,000, but on the upside private sector employment grew by 64,000, a sign that corporations are starting to regain some footing.

New York stock futures improved following the report with the Dow Jones industrial futures down three points, to 10,909, the Nasdaq futures were up 1.5 points to 2,015.5 while the S&P 500 futures inched up 0.6 of a point to 1,157.1.

Meanwhile in Canada, new economic data showed that the domestic job machine faltered in September, even as the jobless rate edged lower.

Statistics Canada reported that the economy shed 6,600 jobs, against the addition of 10,000 that economists were expecting.

The unemployment rate surprisingly dropped one-tenth of a point to 8%, but the agency said that only occurred because fewer people, particularly young workers, were actively looking for work last month.

The currency picked up following the release of the American employment report, rising 0.16 of a cent to 98.34 cents US.

Commodity prices also improved after the U.S. data with the November crude contract on the New York Mercantile Exchange well off earlier lows, down 24 cents to US$81.43 a barrel.

Bullion prices reversed course and headed higher as the December gold contract on the Nymex rose $11.50 to US$1,346.50 an ounce while December copper rose four cents to US$3.72 a pound.

Earlier in Asia, Japan’s Nikkei 225 stock average lost 1.0%.

Shares in mainland China jumped, with investors playing catch-up as financial markets reopened after the weeklong National Day holidays. The Shanghai Composite index vaulted 3.1% while Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index gained 0.3%.

London’s FTSE 100 lost 0.52%, Frankfurt’s DAX was off 0.02% while the Paris CAC 40 was down 0.24%.

On the corporate front, there was a positive start to the U.S. third quarter earnings season as aluminum giant Alcoa reported third-quarter results slightly above Wall Street expectations after the market close Thursday. It expects global aluminum consumption to grow 13% this year, up from a forecast of 12% growth in the second quarter.

Research In Motion Ltd. (TSX:RIM) will also be in focus after the United Arab Emirates backed off a threat to cut key services on BlackBerry smartphones, just days before the ban was set to take effect. The Gulf federation was planning to shut off BlackBerry messaging, email and Web browsing services Monday over security concerns.

The Emirates telecommunications regulator confirms that a deal has been reached with Canadian device maker Research in Motion that brought the devices into compliance with local laws. However, it isn’t clear what concessions, if any, the Canadian device maker made to avert the ban.