Welcome to Seeking Alpha's Wall Street brunch, our Sunday look ahead to this week's

market-moving events, along with the weekend's top news and analysis.

Hello, today is Sunday, September 28th, and I'm your host, Kim Kahn.

There's a lot of ifs this coming week.

Fed chairman J. Powell could get more

dovish on cuts this year if September jobs numbers show a drop in payrolls. But that's only if

President Donald Trump doesn't try to fire Powell before payrolls Friday, as the president

seemed to foreshadow in a post this week. And we'll get those numbers on Friday if Congress can

avert a government shutdown that is due to

begin on Wednesday. So let's start with the jobs numbers. Economists expect the payrolls rose by just

39,000 in September, with the unemployment rate staying steady at 3.9%, and average hourly earnings

rising by 0.3%. Wells Fargo economists say, after flying high in the start of the year, job growth has lost

significant altitude in recent months. The monthly pace of payroll growth has averaged only 29,000

in the three months through August. The slowdown has coincided with the unemployment rate

inching up over the past two months, reaching a nearly four-year high of 4.3% in August, they added.

While the labor market is not in freefall,

recent data signal that it continues to sputter. The weak jobs market was the key reason the Fed

cut rates by a quarter point at its last meeting, but the recent comments from Powell

indicated the Fed chief is reluctant to go all in on the easing, with inflation creeping higher.

On Friday, the August spending and income figure showed the core PCE price index staying in an annual rate of 2.9%

well north of the 2% target.

Odds of two Fed rate cuts this year fell to 65% from about 80% a week ago as longer-term Treasury yields rose.

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