Private employ­ers in the US shed the largest num­ber of jobs in two-and-ahalf years in Septem­ber, accord­ing to unof­fi­cial data that investors are rely­ing on because of the gov­ern­ment shut­down.

Private sec­tor employ­ment fell by 32,000 last month, payroll pro­cessing group ADP said, con­found­ing eco­nom­ists’ expect­a­tions for an extra 50,000 roles and trig­ger­ing a rally in Treas­ur­ies.

The US gov­ern­ment shut down for the first time in nearly seven years early yes­ter­day, tip­ping Wash­ing­ton into one of the biggest polit­ical crises of Pres­id­ent Don­ald Trump’s second term.

The clos­ure is expec­ted to res­ult in the fur­lough of around 750,000 work­ers and could cost the US eco­nomy bil­lions of dol­lars’ worth of lost out­put after Repub­lic­ans and Demo­crats failed to strike an agree­ment to fund the fed­eral gov­ern­ment into the new fiscal year.