Reuters

An array of U.S. merchants in Georgia and other states prepared on Thursday to reopen for the first time in a month under newly relaxed coronavirus restrictions, as another week of massive unemployment claims highlighted the grim economic toll of the pandemic.

The U.S. House of Representatives overwhelmingly approved a $484 billion coronavirus relief bill on Thursday, funding small businesses and hospitals and pushing the total spending response to the crisis to an unprecedented near $3 trillion.

Asian shares and U.S. stock futures fell on Friday, spurred by doubts about progress in the development of drugs to treat COVID-19 and new evidence of U.S. economic damage caused by the coronavirus pandemic.

Virgin Australia Holdings Ltd owes A$6.9 billion ($4.39 billion) to more than 10,000 creditors based on an initial review and will seek a three-month payment waiver from aircraft lessors, according to the company's administrators.

Oil prices rose on Friday, gaining further ground as some producers like Kuwait said they would move to cut output swiftly to try to counter the evaporation in global demand for fuels caused by the coronavirus pandemic.

Facebook Inc has removed "pseudoscience" as an option for advertisers that want to target audiences, a category available until this week even as the world's largest social media network vowed to curb misinformation about the COVID-19 pandemic.

A preliminary survey of New York state residents found that nearly 14% of those tested had antibodies against the novel coronavirus, suggesting that some 2.7 million may already have been infected, Governor Andrew Cuomo said on Thursday.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Thursday reported 828,441 cases of the novel coronavirus, an increase of 25,858 from its previous count, and said the number of deaths had risen by 1,804 to 46,379.

U.S. coronavirus deaths topped 49,000 on Thursday as the number of lives lost in April rises by an average of 2,000 a day, according to a Reuters tally.

Virgin Australia Holdings Ltd owes A$6.9 billion ($4.39 billion) to more than 10,000 creditors based on an initial review, according to an affidavit from one of the company's administrators.

L Brands Inc filed a legal complaint against Sycamore Partners on Thursday, after the buyout firm walked away from a $525 million deal to acquire a majority stake in the company's Victoria's Secret lingerie brand.

Several brokerages, including discount giant TD Ameritrade Corp are restricting customers from buying new positions in certain crude oil contracts after an unprecedented sell-off that sent prices below negative-$40 on Monday.

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said he is considering a government lending program for U.S. oil companies looking for federal aid as they cope with a devastating plunge in prices, Bloomberg News reported on Thursday.

Boeing Co is planning to cut 787 Dreamliner output by about half and announce job cuts in its first-quarter earnings report, Bloomberg news reported https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-04-23/boeing-poised-to-cut-dreamliner-output-jobs-on-plunging-demand on Thursday.

Asia equities face a bumpy session on Friday after Wall Street pared early gains as optimism over a rebound in oil prices and prospects for further government stimulus were offset by stark economic data showing the toll of the coronavirus pandemic.

U.S. companies on Thursday began refusing government loans they were just awarded, after the Treasury Department said that publicly traded firms would have a hard time proving they really needed the coronavirus relief funds.

Hertz Global Holdings Inc is working with debt restructuring advisers to explore options for shoring up its finances after the coronavirus pandemic killed demand for car rentals, people familiar with the matter said on Thursday.

The U.S. House of Representatives overwhelmingly approved a $484 billion coronavirus relief bill on Thursday, funding small businesses and hospitals and pushing the total spending response to the crisis to an unprecedented near $3 trillion.

The S&P 500 ended marginally lower on Thursday after a report that an experimental antiviral drug for the coronavirus flopped in its first randomized clinical trial, denting optimism that the pandemic's impact on the labor market was nearing an end.

Argentina plans to issue a decree setting a higher local oil barrel price to protect the domestic industry from being further decimated by a collapse in global prices and slumping fuel demand due to the coronavirus pandemic, two industry sources told Reuters on Thursday.