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Some businesses prepared on Thursday to reopen in Georgia and a handful of other U.S. states for the first time in a month, as another week of massive unemployment claims highlighted the grim economic toll of the coronavirus pandemic.

Blackstone Group Inc , the world's largest manager of alternative assets such as private equity and real estate, reported a 4% rise in first-quarter distributable earnings on Thursday, driven by a surge in management fees, even as its funds took a hit in the coronavirus-induced downturn.

Hundreds of members of the U.S. House of Representatives gathered in Washington on Thursday to pass a $484 billion coronavirus relief bill, bringing the unprecedented total of funds approved for the crisis to nearly $3 trillion.

U.S. coronavirus deaths topped 48,000 on Thursday as the number of lives lost in April rises by an average of 2,000 a day, according to a Reuters tally.

Some workers in Georgia and other U.S. states prepared to go back to work for the first time in a month, as data released on Thursday showing soaring unemployment claims reaffirmed the grim economic toll of the coronavirus pandemic.

Wall Street's main indexes pared gains sharply on Thursday, after a report that Gilead Sciences experimental coronavirus drug flopped in its first randomized clinical trial.

Sales of new U.S. single-family homes dropped by the most in more than 6-1/2 years in March and further declines are likely as the novel coronavirus outbreak batters the economy and throws millions of Americans out of work.

Lufthansa is aiming to finalise a state aid rescue package worth up to 10 billion euros ($10.8 billion) next week after the coronavirus crisis forced it to ground almost all of its planes, people close to the matter said.

Ma Xinli has shut four of his clothing stores and expects to close another three by mid-June. Unsold winter stock is now hard to sell, there's no money to buy summer clothing, and rent and staff salaries still need paying.

World stock markets climbed on Thursday as investors weighed a rebound in oil prices and prospects for further government stimulus against stark economic data showing the toll of the coronavirus pandemic.

South African Airways (SAA) faces a wind-down or liquidation after specialists appointed to try to save the state-owned airline said on Thursday they had run out of funds.

Eli Lilly and Co raised the top-end of its 2020 profit forecast on Thursday and reported better-than-expected quarterly results, as customers stocking up medicines such as diabetes drug Trulicity during the coronavirus pandemic boosted sales.

A highly valued public company will have a hard time getting a coronavirus relief loan, the U.S. Treasury said on Thursday, just as Congress was poised to approve a new round of funding for the loans known as the Paycheck Protection Program.

Lufthansa , which has grounded almost all its aircraft due to the coronavirus pandemic, said its operating loss increased to 1.2 billion euros ($1.3 billion) during the first three months of the year and the loss would be considerably higher in the current quarter.

In just a week, Russia has to find ways to cut a fifth of its oil output under a deal to tackle the market glut and is looking at all options, including putting wells on repair and maintenance to abandoning them entirely and even burning oil, four oil industry sources said.

The financial auditors of Colombian airline Avianca Holdings have concluded that "substantial doubt" exists as to the company's ability to stay in business due to the coronavirus crisis, the carrier said.

Wall Street jumped 1% on Thursday as a third straight decline in weekly jobless claims raised hopes the worst of the coronavirus pandemic's impact on the labor market was over, while energy stocks zoomed 5% on a rebound in oil prices.

Specialists appointed to try to save state-owned South African Airways (SAA) said on Thursday that they had no further funds for rescue efforts and that the two remaining options were a wind-down process or placing the company into liquidation.

Domino's Pizza Inc on Thursday pulled its long-term forecast and said international comparable sales fell 3.2% in the first three weeks of the current quarter as stores remain shut due to the coronavirus pandemic, sending its shares down about 5%.

Ziad Abdallah has watched with growing alarm as Lebanon's financial meltdown has threatened the savings he spent 25 years building up in his dollar account.