The United States added 257,000 jobs in the first months of 2015 - making it the 11th consecutive month that more than 200,000 jobs were created. This is the best streak since 1994.

Forecasters had predicted that 228,000 jobs would be created.

The US Labour Department as also revised upwards the number of jobs that were created in November and December - bringing them to 414,000 and 329,000 respectively.

The average amount of jobs created was 336,000 per-month over the last three months - that is the fastest pace in 17 years.

In the same period 12 months ago the corresponding figure was 197,000.

The US unemployment rate is derived from a separate data set - it edged up slightly to 5.7 percent.

Average wages increased by 12 cents to  $24.75 (€21.82) in January - this was the biggest monthly gain since September 2008.

This is largely a result of the Federal Reserve's low interest rate. The amount of people employed is still below 2008 peaks.

In the male 16 to 64 year-old bracket 76.5 percent are employed - compared to 81 percent before the financial crisis.

The recent string of strong labour figures show a new strength in the US economy - this will raise the possibility of a interest rate hike in the middle of 2015.