Coronavirus update: U.S. marks grim milestone as Trump preps executive order on social-media companies

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Coronavirus update: Grim milestone in U.S. as Trump readies executive order

The U.S. death toll from the coronavirus that causes COVID-19 rose above 100,500 on Thursday, one day after it exceeded the 100,000 level, a grim marker for the nation with the highest number of cases and deaths in the world.

The news comes as the number of COVID-19 cases continues to rise around the world, including in countries that appeared to have contained the spread. South Korea reported 79 new infections overnight, its biggest one-day increase in about two months, and is considering reimposing restrictions on movement, the Guardian reported.

The U.S. has 1.7 million cases, or more than a fifth of the total, and 100,576 fatalities, or nearly a third of the total.The U.K. has 268,620 cases and 37,542 deaths, the highest death toll in Europe and second highest in the world after the U.S. What’s the latest medical news? Swiss drug company Roche Holding AG RO, +2.46% is testing a combination of its rheumatoid arthritis drug Actemra with Gilead Sciences Inc.’s GILD, +1.03% remdesivir in hospitalized COVID-19 patients.

Economists surveyed by MarketWatch had been looking for 2.12 million new claims. A new federal relief program for so-called gig workers like Uber Technologies Inc.’s UBER, +0.33% drivers, totaled 1.2 million last week. Separately, the government said durable goods orders tumbled 17.2% in April, although that was better than the 18.2% decline economists polled by MarketWatch were expecting.

The index measures real-estate transactions where a contract was signed but the sale had not yet closed, benchmarked to contract-signing activity in 2001. It is an indicator of existing-home sales reports in the coming months.“Mortgage applications for purchases have fully unwound their previous plunge, suggesting sales are rebounding in May,” Sal Guatieri, senior economist at BMO Capital Markets, wrote in a research note.

Printing, especially printer supplies, has long been a money-maker for HP, which sells high-margin ink cartridges to its printer customers, as MarketWatch’s Therese Poletti noted. With many big tech companies no longer planning to have workers return to offices, HP’s corporate printing business is likely to suffer, she wrote.

• Boeing Co. BA, +2.92% is laying off 6,770 U.S. workers,and the first employees affected will be notified this week. International locations also are planning layoffs that will be announced on their own timelines. Boeing said it is seeing “green shoots” after the devastation wrought by the virtual halt on air travel, but the industry will take “some years to return to what it was just two months ago.

• Lumber Liquidators Holdings Inc. LL, +9.96% reported first-quarter profit that was well above expectations, but sales that came up short, including a surprise decline in same-store sales given the effects of the pandemic. The wood flooring company swung to profit, as it booked a tax benefit of $4.4 million, compared with an expense of $0.2 million last year, as provisions of the CARES Act allowed the company to carry back certain losses and deduct certain capital expenditures.

 

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No one care about 100000 dead because it is just a number. He/She will have the pain If their relatives were infected and dead. How bad it is.

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