Jobs report could shake stocks

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Stocks are likely to face another volatile trading day after the government's monthly job report came in weaker than expected.

At 8:30 a.m. ET, futures were lower, with a comparison to fair value pointing to a mixed open for U.S. stocks after the reading on employment.

Employers added 92,000 jobs in July, marking the slowest pace since February, the Labor Department said. The unemployment rate rose to 4.6 percent.

Employers were forecast to have added 135,000 jobs to payrolls last month, up slightly from a revised gain of 126,000 jobs in June, according to economists surveyed by Briefing.com. The unemployment rate was forecast to remain at 4.5 percent.

Stocks have advanced the past two sessions despite a chill in the credit markets and problems hitting mortgage lenders. There was some more bad news on that front to greet investors Friday morning.

American Home Mortgage (Charts) said it would shut down after lenders had cut off credit. The nation's 10th largest mortgage provider said nearly 7,000 jobs would be cut.

And the CEO of IndyMac Bancorp (Charts) said late Thursday that the market for mortgage-backed bonds has become "very panicked and illiquid," forcing the lender to make major changes to its pricing and underwriting guidelines. The company is the No. 1 lender of so-called "Alt-A" loans which don't demand the verification of income required in most home loans.

Shares lost 5 percent in after-hours trading on the news.

Overseas markets took a cue from Wall Street's Thursday rally. Asian markets finished the session higher. No. 1 automaker Toyota Motor (Charts) reported a better than expected jump in profits after the close of trading in Tokyo. European stocks rose in morning trading.

South Korea's Samsung Electronics said production at six chip lines at its plant near Seoul was disrupted after a power system exploded, a problem that could lead to a global shortage of some kinds of flash memory chips in the second half of this year.

In other corporate news, Take-Two Interactive Software (Charts) warned after the bell Thursday that it would delay its most important upcoming video game, "Grand Theft Auto IV", and that it would post a full-year loss. Shares plunged almost 19 percent in after-hours trading.

Treasury prices were higher in early trading after the jobs report, taking the yield on the 10-year note to 4.73 percent from the 4.77 percent level reached late Thursday. The dollar was higher against the euro and little changed versus the yen in early trading.

Oil prices edged higher in early trading, as the price of U.S. light crude rose 25 cents to $77.11 a barrel in electronic trading.