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Five Things You Need to Know to Start Your Day

Five Things You Need to Know to Start Your Day

(Bloomberg) --

Good morning. The U.S. house passed an aid bill, Boris Johnson may return to work and there’s another round of earnings. Here’s what’s moving markets.

U.S. Aid 

The U.S. House of Representatives passed a $484 billion coronavirus aid package that will replenish funding to the Paycheck Protection Program for small businesses, bringing the total coronavirus-related spending there to nearly $3 trillion. Meanwhile, publicly traded companies deemed critical to national security that seek a share of $17 billion in virus-related relief will be required to offer an equity stake to the government. U.S. infections rose at the slowest pace in three weeks and U.S. President Donald Trump said social distancing guidelines will be extended until “we feel safe.”

Back to work

U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson plans to return to Downing Street as early as Monday following his bout with Covid-19, according to the Telegraph newspaper, which also said his office had insisted no final decision has been made. During his absence, ministers have been reluctant to discuss when they will relax the lockdown first imposed March 23 as economic damage mounts. Read more here about the week that coronavirus got away from Johnson’s government.

Earnings

It’s the final day to a heavy week of earnings and we’ll get updates from foodmaker Nestle SA and drugmaker Sanofi. If there is any consensus to the season so far, it’s that no one really knows what to expect this year: at least a quarter of companies in the European benchmark index have given up trying to predict how 2020 will turn out and at least 171 of them have canceled or postponed dividends. Next week will see reports from some of the region’s banks including Deutsche Bank and Barclays.

Oil Steadies

After a dramatic week that saw prices below zero for the first time in history, oil continued to claw back losses as attention turned to production cuts in response to the demand hit from the coronavirus pandemic. To help lower production, U.S. operators have already started to shut old wells and halt new drilling, actions that could reduce output by 20% while other countries have said they are scaling back production earlier than required to under the OPEC+ deal.

Coming Up…

Asian stocks slipped Friday along with U.S. and European futures as investors weighed signs of progress in the fight against the coronavirus versus mounting data showing the severity of the impact on economies. Gilead Sciences Inc. shares whipsawed for the second time in a week after a summary of a Chinese trial of its Covid-19 drug appeared to show the treatment was a failure.

What We’ve Been Reading

This is what’s caught our eye over the past 24 hours. 

©2020 Bloomberg L.P.