Dow a tripledigit gain. The hope is the poor showing on the jobs front would be the reason for the Federal Reserve to delay raising Interest Rates until later in the year. Sentiment also improved when a reading on the Services Sector came in in line with estimates, and still showed growth. And then new york fed president bill dudley said chill, when the fed does raise rates, he said it wont be that bad. The likely task of shortterm Interest Rates after liftoff is as important as the timing of liftoff. I anticipate the path will be relatively shallow. The headwinds in the aftermath of the financial crisis are still in evidence particularly the diminished availability and the tough returns we see for Residential Mortgage credit. Add it up up and the Dow Jones Industrial avera rose 117 points closing at 17,880. The nasdaq was higher by 30 and the s p 500 was up 13. Thats how wall street felt. But theres no way around the fact that the jobs number last friday was not a good one. As Hampton Pearson tells us wall street and main street often see the economy very differently, and for good reason. Reporter in march, the government says the economy produced only about half the jobs expecte and when combined with revisions for january and february job growth for the first order of this year now stands at 197,000 per month compared to 269,000 for all of 2014. Now the guessing game about the economy begins. Its going to be important to monitor development to determine whether the softness in the march labor Market Report we saw on friday whether that foreshows a substantial slowing in the labor force than i currently anticipate. The march labor Market Report is an indicator whether it will be weak. Reporter and whether the slowdown on the west coast ports were the cut for the Economic Forecast in the First Quarter, but maybe theyre predicting a rebound in the Second Quarter. I dont think the economy is that fragile. We should not overreact to one missed unemployment report. This is an estimate of the seasonally adjusted change in the magnitude of 140 million people. To miss by over 100,000, that does happen from time to time. Whats going to happen here is the economy is going to rebound, and i do think there are questions about how much it rebounds. I think the idea that the economys going to do better in the Second Quarter is pretty clear on a number of fronts. Reporter for now it appears market concerns over a faltering economy are taking a back seat to expectations of the First Quarter slowdown further postponing a rate hike from the fed. They traded off something called patience in their verbiage for caution. They are going to be treading lightly because they are figuring were still on thin ice and theyll continue to be on thin ice. But they would rather hedge against moving too soon and postpone raising rates than do it too soon and have to retrace their steps. Reporter in the coming weeks, earnings reports, the value of the dollar and the price of oil could all change both fed and market expectations. For nightly Business Report, im Hampton Pearson in washington. As if all of that wasnt bad enough the Energy Sector will be front and center in the one thing thats definitely going to get wall streets attention over the next few weeks. That would be corporate earnings. While Energy Earnings are probably going to be bad, bob tells us theyll have plenty of company. And thats not a good thing. Reporter this week starts earnings season for the First Quarter, and weve got a big problem. Is an earnings recession going on. Earnings growth for the s p 500 is expected to be down more than 4 compared to the First Quarter a year ago. The Third Quarter is just barely positive. And its dropping fast. This is not good news. Thats why a disappointing jobs report on top of other disappointing economic stats recently is a cause for concern. Companies cannot cut costs to keep earnings growing forever. We need the economy to grow. To support higher revenues thats the top line and higher earnings thats the bottom line. But wall street is not optimistic about this. Not only is Earnings Growth negative but Revenue Growth is now expected to be negative for the s p 500 for the next three quarters. Yikes its well known that Energy Companies are the main problem. We all know this. But theyre not the only ones six of the 10 s p sectors are expected to report negative Earnings Growth including technology in the First Quarter. Thats why weak job Growth Numbers are so worrisome. Even if the fed doesnt raise rates until late in the year it suggests choppy sideways action for stocks in 2015. That is unless the recent weak data is just a blip. For nightly Business Report, im bob pasani at the new york stock exchange. The oil patch, the reason Falling Oil Prices were leading to layoffs. That manifested itself in last months jobs report and in a big way. When it comes to labor pain Morgan Brennan tells us this might just be the beginning. Reporter taking a toll on jobs in the oil patch. Energy companies have been laying oftens of thousands of workers. Those cuts were particularly high in march. According to the Labor Department the mining category which includes oil and gas shed 11,000 jobs. The Third Straight month of losses. Bringing the total for the First Quarter up to 30,000 jobs lost. To put that in perspective. Mining added 41,000 in 2014 meaning roughly 3 4 of last years gains have already been erased. Economists expect those losses to continue. I suspect in april, may, june well continue to see sizeable losses. 10,000 20,000 jobs lost per month. It will be a bit of a drag on the overall picture. But i think theres still a fair amount of underlying strength in terms of job growth in the u. S. That it wont derail things. Reporter as the number of u. S. Oil rigs have dramatically dropped, payrolls have followed suit. Oil Field ServicesCompanies Making some of the biggest cuts. Among the states hardest hit, texas, oklahoma and north dakota which has a february no longer touts the countrys lowest unemployment rate. Its beginning to ripple out to other industries as well particularly manufacturing. Employment growth in manufacturing steadily decelerates over the last few months. We had about 45,000 jobs plus positive in november. And then last month it was a minus 1,000 jobs. That could be further in negative territory in the next few months. Reporter the fracking boon had been a bright spot for manufacturers. Fueling demand for oil and Gas Equipment and metal piping. But now companies are caused like u. S. Steel to idle plants and lay off thousands of workers. For nightly Business Report, im Morgan Brennan. John mattingly joins us to talk about the latest jobs report upcoming earnings season what it all means for your money. John always good to see you. Thank you. Ve a long sort of series there of packages that lays out a lot of the issues that the economy is facing. Do you think were in just a soft patch, or do you think that we are in a phase where we have to ratchet down our expectations for growth for corporate profits and hence for the stock market . No i dont think its the latter. I think its a soft patch. I think its caused by the dollar caused by the oil. Those are things that go up and down. I still think the economy is Getting Better on balance. I think we see that within a couple of quarters. Lets turn to earnings. A lot of people have dismal outlooks for First Quarter earnings even negative numbers in front of Earnings Growth. In other words e earnings would be down from where they were a year ago. What do you think . I think its a low hurdle rate. Were ve concerned about our news. Sometimes we look at earnings right now sometimes we look out three to six months from now. I think what theyre doing because the fed is starting to look out, theyll see that this is probably as bad as it gets right now. If you take energy out of that earnings picture, it will be a lot nicer to look at wont it . It will be a lot nicer. But you cant take it out. Its there. Once oil goes down at some point in time we start to get the earnings back in other sectors. So what we give away today, we get back hopefully in spades a few quarters from now. How do i make money in an environment like this john . I think you own stocks. Its a very simple thing. You want to own technology. I think the technology moves are moved by the strong dollar. You want to own financials. They lagged a little bit, but actually whenever the fed raises rates, they wont do it in such a manner to tighten it for a while. I think you want to bottom fish some of the big Energy Companies, i i get a tax refund in the next few weeks, where would you put it . In the tex nolg areas . I should have said europe. They keep on Getting Better. Theres a term going on in europe the fundamentals are changing over there. Western europe if i dont own it already. What i hear you saying here is not to worry folks, were in a soft patch here. We may not have a blockbuster kind of year but this is not the time for you to reoriest your portfolio from a normal stands to a very defensive stance. I dont see whats going to make it go down. The fed is not stupid. The fed is not going to raise Interest Rates until the economy gets better. They wont tighten until well after theyve raised Interest Rates for the first time. They know what the problems are. As long as theyre there, thats a tailwind for the market going forward. You just made an interesting distinction there. Its going to be different you made a distinction between raising Interest Rates and tightening. They tighten when they want to restrain the economy. As the economy gets stronger it can handle higher Interest Rates. Our First Mortgage was 12 . I thought it was such a great deal. Rates go up and down but the economy being stronger allows for higher rates. Its still stimulus. All the fed does at the beginning i think is just chase the natural rate of interest higher as the economy gets better. Only when things start to show inflationary ten des idensies do they tighten. I had one of those mortgages, too, john. It didnt feel. Thank you very much. John mattingly with wells fargo management. The strong dollar one of the subtexts weve been talking about. Currencies over the last six months or so is starting to take its toll on smaller manufacturers. In particular some companies that export their products that are made here in the u. S. Kate rogers has more. Reporter the dollars run up over the past six months dominating everyonemuch of the headlines. The dollar put a squeeze on their business. When the dollar moved higher against foreign currencies, big manufacturs have the ability to ship production to offshore facilities where labor is cheaper. Or to cut prices and absorb lower margins. For smaller companies, thats not always an option. Since october, the dollar is up more than 15 versus the euro and nearly 10 versus the yen. For manufacturers like garrett blake, the dollar runup is already affecting his orders. Carbon fiber book stands 50 of his business comes from exports with customers in japan, singapore, tie land and greece. Lets say in japan, because of the strength of the dollar it is making it more difficult for them to be profitable with our product. Reporter in an effort to keep their business blake said hes trying to accommodate overseas customers by cutting shipping costs. Well do what we can. Were all in this together. Reporter the preliminary data shows that in 2013 95 of all identified u. S. Exporters were smaller medium size businesses. Thats about 300,000 exporters, accounting for nearly half a billion dollars. While that dollar amount may be small in terms of the larger economy, the number of businesses and workers impacted by exports is wide ranging. Lisa says shes also concerned about losing customers to cheaper competitors due to the strong dollar. She exports engine cooling products and incubation systems for fish hatcherys from her business near seattl we have competitors out of china that have mimicked our product. The stronger the dollar becomes, the more expensive it is for them to buy our product. So if we cant offer them a deeper discount, theyre going to take more of their business to offshore competitors. Reporter its not far off with the fears, either. Analysts and trade groups have already said u. S. Manufacturers face stiffer competition overseas because of the dollar. Because the companies we spoke with say theyre committed to keeping business here in america, the question is just how much it will cost them. For nightly Business Report, i up next the possible rift between big business and one of its traditionally strongest constituencies. What does it mean for corporate america, and possibly the big business is starting to feel some backlash from some of its historically staumplgest supporters. Social conservatives. And there could be some big ramifica ayman, whats going on . Hi tyler. The alliance over the past number of years, in the wake of the big fight in indiana over gay rights gay marriage and religious freedom, were seeing a bit of a rift between social conservatives and big business. Take a look at some of these quotes that were starting to see in the media, starting with senator ted cruz. You get a sense of the kind of feeling among social conservatives. Quoted in the New York Times saying, the fortune 500 is running shamelessly to endorse the radical gay marriage agenda over religious liberty. Look at tony perkins, at the Family Research council group. He said you want to roll back religious freedom, goodbye wal mat, hello conservative grocery. Apple and walmart helped sink laws meant to defend religious liberty. A clear schism emerging between the social conservatives and big business folks. Social conservatives saying they dont necessarily worry about the value we hold dear in the conservative movement. Recognized domestic partnerships and providing benefits and so forth. Do we think this is a permanent split . Well thats going to be one of the key questions going into 2016. It is a fraying of the relationship this week. Were definitely seeing that. Whether that can be those ties can be mended over the course of the next couple months is going to be the big question for 2016. Republican candidates for president , well have to pick sides in this. What does it mean for businesses . One of the quotations you cited there is goodbye to walmart, hello neighborhood. Right. Do those kinds of exhortations or threats have teeth . That was the quote about walmart. Fascinating to see walmart being criticized from the right for so many years, walmart was the target of people on the left who disliked walmart for what they saw as an antiunion stance. Now youre seeing folks on the right who are upset about walmarts weighing into this religious liberty and gay marriage debate down in arkansas. That debate has flopped entirely. Thats going to mean very trick yich navigation for ceos of these big companies. We saw in indiana a lot of the big ceos of Indiana Companies coming up strongly on the side of gay marriage and marriage freedom in that state. So thats something that those ceos have decided is right for their businesses in that state. It will be fascinating to watch, and a fascinating president ial campaign. Ayman, thank you. Dupont on the offensive against activists, and thats where we start the market focus. The company says the activist Investment Firm proposal to break it up would cost 4 billion and diminish the chemical Companys Research capability. It comes as dupont is trying to resist tryons efforts to replace four of its direct shares rose a fraction to 72. Hudson city Bank Corporate planned merger is delayed, which weighed down shares of both companies today. The combination has been delayed before. The Federal Reserve said it still doesnt have a decision. Shares of hudson city off almost 7 to 9. 77. That made it the worst performing stock in the s p 500 today. M t fell to 123. 76. Shares of mattel had a rough ride lately on analyst upgrade. Toy maker ready to buy b. Reilly and a new ceo to restore the company. Duke energy is going to buy back 1. 5 billion worth of its stock under an accelerated stock repurchase program. If you have duke in your stock market bracket, youre happy today. Up about 1. 7 . True car impressed investors with news that it added 840 new dealers to its car buying thats a website in the First Quarter, that is the best quarterly total ever bringing all of its dealers now the total to an alltime high of more than 10,000.