The US employment data released on Friday has been very disappointing, revealing much-bigger-than-expected job cuts, and it seems to indicate that there will be many challenges which the US economy might have to face over the coming times. Although the country's economy is picking up, it is definitely not ready to scale new heights and consumer confident could be kept low and this could further hurt the recovery.

For the month of December, employers axed 85,000 full-time non-farm jobs, as was confirmed by the Labor Department report, which are much more than the 8,000-10,000 job losses that were being expected by economists and analysts.

However, the rate of unemployment did manage to stay steady at 10% for the month, and experts also revised November's employment figures to show a positive growth.

"The job market took a step back in December. Businesses are curtailing their layoffs, but they have yet to begin hiring, as they struggle to get credit and lack the confidence to expand their operations", said Mark Zandi, the chief economist for Moody's Economy. com.

December's many job cuts have also dashed hopes that a return to hiring would soon be happening.