Here’s what you need to know:
- Asian markets mixed, but futures point to a Wall Street slump.
- Retail sales are expected to be dismal, but have they reached their bottom?
- China’s economy shows hints of recovery as virus threat recedes.
- Stocks end volatile Thursday with a gain as oil prices jump.
- A showdown in France tests Amazon’s ability to sidestep labor.
Asian markets mixed, but futures point to a Wall Street slump.
Asian markets were mixed on Friday after a topsy-turvy week of trading, and futures markets indicated that Wall Street could open with a loss later in the day.
Regional markets failed to sustain a late Wall Street rally on Thursday. Trading in U.S. Treasury bonds was similarly mixed. Oil prices on futures markets were higher, but the gains were small compared to the surge that helped power the late surge in the United States.
Investors were reacting to Chinese economic data that showed factory activity picking up but the country’s shoppers were still reluctant to spend. They were also reacting to renewed bellicose language from President Trump on the U.S.-China economic relationship.
In Japan, the Nikkei 225 index was down 0.3 percent midday. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index was flat. The Shanghai Composite index in mainland China was up 0.1 percent. South Korea’s Kospi was up 0.1 percent. Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 was up 0.4 percent.
Retail sales are expected to be dismal, but have they reached their bottom?
The government’s monthly report on retail sales is due Thursday morning, and the results are likely to be ugly.
Economists surveyed by Bloomberg expect the report to show that sales fell 12 percent, even more than March’s 8.4 percent drop. That would add up to the worst two-month decline on record.
April could prove to be the bottom. The March figures were helped in part by panic-buying, and stores were generally open for the first half of the month. Most states have begun to lift barriers to commerce and movement, and many economists expect spending to rise in May as people venture out.
But any rebound is likely to be gradual. There is no guarantee that customers will return in numbers previously seen — and even if Americans feel comfortable going out to shop, they may not have as much money to spend, because millions have lost their jobs.
The downturn may have left lasting scars. J. Crew and Neiman Marcus have filed for bankruptcy protection, and other big retailers like J.C. Penney, which employs nearly 85,000 people, are expected to follow.
China’s economy shows hints of recovery as virus threat recedes.
China’s factories maintained a brisk pace last month, but Chinese consumers were slow to resume shopping, according to official statistics released on Friday.
Many countries have been watching China’s economic performance closely because it is several months ahead of the rest of the world in coping with the virus. The Chinese economy shrank in the first three months of this year for the first time since Mao Zedong died in 1976.
Factories caught up on orders that they had struggled to fill earlier this year, when the coronavirus pandemic raced across the country. The country’s industrial production was up 3.9 percent from April of last year, better than most economists expected. Production had been down 1.1 percent in March from a year earlier and had plunged in February, when the virus outbreak was at its worst in China.
But shopping and fixed asset investment stayed weak. Retail sales were down 7.5 percent in April compared to a year earlier, marginally worse than economists’ expectations.
“We should be aware that given the continuous spread of the epidemic abroad, the stability and recovery of the national economy is still faced with multiple challenges,” said Liu Aihua, the director general of the agency’s department of comprehensive statistics.
Strong exports kept factories busy last month. Many factories were catching up on orders placed while Chinese cities were locked down. But orders for further exports have stalled, according to surveys of purchasing managers.
Despite the progress, tens of millions of migrant workers are unemployed. Many white-collar workers have suffered pay cuts. Weak consumption has some economists wondering how long China can sustain an economic rebound.
Stocks end volatile Thursday with a gain as oil prices jump.
Stocks ended a turbulent day of trading on Thursday with a solid gain, after a rebound fueled in part by a surge in oil prices.
The S&P 500 rose more than 1 percent, after recovering from an early drop of nearly 2 percent.
The early drop was fueled partly by the Labor Department’s latest report on unemployment claims, which showed that millions of workers are still losing their jobs.
But stocks rose out of that slump as oil prices jumped, prompting gains in shares of energy companies like oil services giant Halliburton and Occidental Petroleum. West Texas Intermediate, the U.S. crude benchmark, rose about 9 percent. At more than $27 a barrel, oil is now far above the lows that it plumbed in April.
The gains in oil prices came as the chief of the International Energy Agency said on Thursday that he saw “signs of a gradual rebalancing” in the oil market. Global demand for oil fell in April to about 25 percent below its normal level, the agency said, but it is expected to slowly recover as more countries ease lockdown measures.
Financial stocks also rallied on Thursday, with shares of Wells Fargo up more than 6 percent. and Capital One Financial up more than 9 percent.
It’s been a tumultuous week for stocks, as investors heard a drumbeat of warnings about the pandemic and its long-term impact.
On Tuesday, Dr. Anthony S. Fauci spoke about the serious risk of a new outbreak if the economy was reopened too quickly. On Wednesday, the Federal Reserve chair, Jerome H. Powell, warned of permanent damage to the economy if Congress and the White House did not provide sufficient financial support to prevent a wave of bankruptcies and prolonged joblessness.
A showdown in France tests Amazon’s ability to sidestep labor.
A labor case headed to France’s highest court is testing Amazon’s ability to sidestep the demands of workers who are fulfilling the surge in orders the pandemic has produced for Amazon’s business.
It is also emblematic of why Amazon, based in Seattle, has battled to keep unions out of the company, especially in the United States, its biggest market, write Liz Alderman and Adam Satariano.
Unions in the United States have made few inroads after years of campaigns. But in Europe, national labor laws require companies to deal with them, even if employees aren’t members. With more than 150,000 deaths in Europe from the coronavirus, the groups are leveraging the crisis to reassert influence and press Amazon harder on workers’ rights.
“The only way to push Amazon to action is through confrontation,” said Jean-François Bérot, who works at an Amazon warehouse south of Paris. “We’re working in conditions that pose a risk to our safety. Workers’ voices must be heard.”
Amazon defended its response to the virus, saying it had put in place more than 150 changes at its warehouses, including providing masks, temperature checks, hand sanitizer, increased time off and higher pay. It expects to have more than $4 billion of coronavirus-related expenses in the current quarter.
“We respect everyone’s right to express themselves, but object to the irresponsible actions of some labor groups who have spread misinformation and made false claims about Amazon during this crisis,” said Stuart Jackson, an Amazon spokesman.
Catch up: Here’s what else is happening.
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The New York Stock Exchange will begin to reopen its trading floor the day after Memorial Day, the exchange’s president, Stacey Cunningham, wrote in an op-ed article in The Wall Street Journal. As part of “measured reopening plans,” floor brokers will return in small numbers and be required to wear masks. Social distancing requirements will be in place, and workers and visitors will be screened before entry.
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Disney Theatrical Productions said Thursday that its stage adaptation of “Frozen” would not reopen on Broadway once the pandemic eases, making the musical the first to be felled by the current crisis. “We believe that three Disney productions will be one too many titles to run successfully in Broadway’s new landscape,” Thomas Schumacher, the president of Disney Theatrical Productions, said in a letter to his staff.
Reporting was contributed by Mohammed Hadi, Liz Alderman, Adam Satariano, Gregory Schmidt, Carlos Tejada and Daniel Victor.
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