(Bloomberg) — President Xi Jinping said China will make its coronavirus vaccine a global public good once one is available. Xi addressed the World Health Organization’s decision-making meeting shortly after a senior U.S. official suggested Beijing sent airline passengers to spread the coronavirus worldwide.An experimental vaccine from Moderna Inc. showed promising early signs that it can create an immune-system response in the body that could help fend off the virus, based on a small, early human trial. Iran reported the biggest increase in infections in six weeks. Germany recorded a small gain in cases, though the daily death toll fell.Japan’s economy sank into a recession, while in China, demand for oil recovered to almost the level seen before the government imposed a lockdown in February.Key Developments:Virus Tracker: Cases top 4.7 million; deaths exceed 315,000Pandemic shatters world order, sowing anger and mistrustChina faces angry world seeking virus answers at key WHO meetingHow Germany’s relentless contact tracers helped beat virusItaly shops to reopen, but for many it’s too lateSubscribe to a daily update on the virus from Bloomberg’s Prognosis team here. Click VRUS on the terminal for news and data on the coronavirus. See this week’s top stories from QuickTake here.Vaccine From Moderna Shows Early Signs of Immune Response (7:35 a.m. NY)An experimental vaccine from Moderna Inc. showed promising early signs that it can create an immune-system response in the body that could help fend off the virus, according to sampling of data from a small, first human trial of the inoculation.The study was primarily designed to look at the safety of the shot and showed no major warning signs in a small phase 1 trial, the company said in a statement Monday. The trial is being run with the U.S. government, and Moderna plans to continue advancing it to wider testing.Researchers found that at two lower dose levels used in the study, levels of antibodies found after getting a second booster shot of the vaccine either equaled or exceeded the levels of antibodies found in patients who had recovered from the virus.China’s Virus Vaccine Will Be Global Public Good, Xi Says (7:00 a.m. NY)China will make its coronavirus vaccine a global public good once one is available, President Xi Jinping told the World Health Organization’s governing body.Xi’s comments come amid growing concern that countries will put national interests first in the quest for a virus. The WHO is pushing a proposal that aims to ensure broad access to Covid-19 treatments and vaccines while offering an appropriate reward to creators.Chinese Oil Demand Is Almost Back to Pre-Crisis Levels (6:34 a.m. NY)China’s oil demand is all but back to levels last seen before the imposition of a national lockdown, according to people with inside knowledge of the country’s energy industry.China is the world’s second-largest oil consumer, behind the U.S., and the country’s quick turnaround has helped tighten the petroleum market sooner than forecast. West Texas Intermediate crude, which a month ago plunged below zero, surged on Monday above $30 a barrel.In a remarkable turnaround after Chinese demand dropped by about 20% after the February lockdown, consumption of gasoline and diesel has fully recovered as factories reopen and commuters drive rather than use public transport, these people said.Iran Records Acceleration in New Cases (6:04 a.m. NY)Iran reported 2,294 new coronavirus cases on Monday, the largest daily increase in more than six weeks, according to Health Ministry figures.The rise took the overall tally to 122,492 confirmed cases, with more than 7,000 deaths, Kianush Jahanpur, a spokesman for the ministry, said in a televised statement. Iran last month began lifting some restrictions imposed to curtail the virus.Many Bankers in Denmark May Stay Home Permanently (4:55 p.m. HK)In Denmark, bankers and their bosses have been so content with the quality of the work they do from home that almost one-third plan to continue some form of the regime once the crisis is over, according to a survey.Denmark’s economy was shuttered in mid-March, as the government imposed restrictions on movement earlier than many other countries. Since then, about 70% of its finance industry has worked from home. Of the Danish financial firms surveyed in three polls conducted jointly by employers’ and workers’ unions, 85% said they were “very satisfied” or “partly satisfied” with productivity levels during the lockdown.Germany Hopes to Ease Travel Restrictions (4:49 p.m. HK)Germany hopes talks with 10 European Union partners Monday will make progress toward lifting a global travel warning and enabling citizens to take vacations this summer, Foreign Minister Heiko Maas said.Germany has a worldwide travel warning in place through June 14 on unnecessary leisure trips. Although they are being scaled back, controls will remain in place on Germany’s borders with France, Austria and Switzerland until June 15, as well as for arrivals by air from Spain and Italy.Indonesia Rules Out Easing Lockdowns as Cases Spike (2:54 p.m. HK)Indonesian President Joko Widodo ruled out an immediate easing of social distancing rules and ordered officials to strictly enforce a ban on travel during the busy holiday season to prevent a spike in new coronavirus cases.With new infections soaring 73% so far in May, Jokowi, as the president is known, asked officials at a cabinet meeting to increase the surveillance of industrial clusters and focus on enforcing mobility restrictions at the village level. While the government is preparing scenarios for reopening the economy, no deadline has been set yet, he said.Germany’s New Cases Rise, Fatalities Drop (1:24 p.m. HK)Germany recorded a small increase in the number of new coronavirus cases, though the daily death toll fell. There were 617 new cases in the 24 hours through Monday morning, bringing the total to 176,369, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. This compares with 519 new cases reported on Sunday. Fatalities rose by 15 to 7,962.Ryanair Taps Loan Program, Thai Air Nears Restructuring (1:19 p.m. HK)Ryanair Holdings Plc said it received a 600 million-pound ($726 million) loan backed by the U.K. government, boosting liquidity as the coronavirus crisis threatens to reduce passenger numbers by half over the next year.Separately, Thai Airways International Pcl is a step closer to restructuring via a bankruptcy court after a key Thailand government panel backed the plan, which is due for consideration by the Cabinet on Tuesday.Governments worldwide have devoted more than $85 billion to propping up airlines after the coronavirus pandemic wiped out travel demand and grounded fleets.Citigroup to Bring 600 Staff Back to Hong Kong Office (1:16 p.m. HK)Citigroup Inc. said it will allow an additional 600 staff to resume working from their Hong Kong premises on Wednesday after the city relaxed social-distancing curbs amid an overall reduction in the number of new coronavirus infections. Citigroup is joining other Wall Street banks including Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Morgan Stanley in returning to offices.Singapore Tests 30,000 Preschool Staff (11:37 a.m. HK)Singapore is testing 30,000 preschool staff in batches from May 15-26 as the government prepares for the reopening of preschools, according to a message sent via its gov.sg WhatsApp channel. More than 6,000 staff have already been swabbed.“Many have asked whether general services at preschools will resume on 2 June,” Desmond Lee, the city-state’s Minister for Social and Family Development, said in a Facebook post on Sunday. “We are assessing the situation, and hope to be able to make an announcement on this soon.”Thailand’s Economy Contracts for First Time Since 2014 (10:44 a.m. HK)Thailand’s economy contracted in the first quarter for the first time since 2014 as the coronavirus outbreak cut off tourist arrivals and shuttered commerce. Gross domestic product shrank 1.8% from a year ago, the National Economic and Social Development Council said.South Korea Nightclub Cases Rise to 168 (10:21 a.m. HK)South Korea’s health ministry said coronavirus cases related to nightclubs in Seoul increased to 168 as of midnight. The ministry said there has been no drastic increase in the outbreak, with findings of about 10 cases a day on average.About 65,000 people possibly exposed through the nightclubs have been tested so far, as South Korea tries to prevent a possible second wave of infections in the country.China Reports Seven New Cases (8:32 a.m. HK)China reported seven new coronavirus infections, with three of them locally transmitted cases in Jilin province and Shanghai, while four are imported cases in Inner Mongolia.Total deaths in China rose to 4,634, after the National Health Commission said on Sunday that Jilin province revised its fatality count by one.Jilin, in northeastern China, has locked down several cities in the province. President Xi Jinping has called for strengthened controls in the region as a growing cluster of infections near the Russia and North Korea borders threatens to become a second wave.Japan’s Economy Sinks Into a Recession (7:54 a.m. HK)Japan’s economy sank last quarter into a recession that’s likely to deepen further as households limit spending to essentials and companies cut back on investment, production and hiring to stay afloat amid the coronavirus pandemic.Gross domestic product shrank an annualized 3.4% in the three months through March from the previous quarter, the Cabinet Office reported. Economists had forecast a 4.5% fall, as the start of social distancing last quarter crimped consumer spending, while supply-chain disruptions and sliding exports hurt manufacturers.Apple to Reopen 25 U.S. Stores, 12 in Canada (7:30 a.m. HK)Apple Inc. said it’s reopening more than 25 stores across the U.S. and 12 stores in Canada this week, adding to nearly 100 global locations that have reopened to customers after the novel coronavirus outbreak forced them to close. Some stores will offer only curbside or storefront service, the company added in an emailed statement.Brazil Delays Naming Health Minister (7:15 a.m HK)Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro held back from replacing his health minister Sunday, instead joining supporters who marched in front of the presidential palace as the coronavirus crisis deepened.The country was awaiting an announcement following Nelson Teich’s resignation Friday after 29 days on the job as health minister. He had taken over the post in April after Bolsonaro fired his predecessor amid public discord over social distancing.Brazil has 241,080 cases — the fourth-highest in the world — and 16,118 deaths so far, according to data released on Sunday.Trump Wants Stadiums ‘Loaded’ With Fans (5:10 p.m. NY)Donald Trump said the return of professional sports is essential for the “psyche of our country” in rebounding from the pandemic but signaled impatience with plans to play games without spectators.“We want big stadiums loaded with people,” Trump said as he called into the broadcast of a charity golf event. “We don’t want 15,000 people watching Alabama-LSU.”U.S. Cases Rise 1.5%, Below Week’s Average (4 p.m. NY)U.S. cases increased 1.5% from the same time Saturday to 1.48 million, according to data collected by Johns Hopkins University and Bloomberg News. The rise was below the average daily increase of 1.6% for the past seven days.Deaths rose 1.1% to 89,207.New York reported 1,889 new cases, bringing the total to 350,121, new deaths were 139 — a seven-week low — as the state total rose to 22,619.U.K. First to Get AstraZeneca Vaccine (1 p.m. NY)AstraZeneca Plc will make as many as 30 million doses of vaccine available to the U.K. by September and deliver 100 million this year. The U.K. will get first access to the vaccine should it be successful.The vaccine, being developed at the University of Oxford, will get 65.5 million pounds ($79 million) of funding, U.K. Business Secretary Alok Sharma said. The inoculation is being studied in humans and could reach late-stage trials by mid-year. Another 18.5 million pounds will go to Imperial College London as trials accelerate.Trump Aide Blames China for Spread (10:23 a.m. NY)The Trump administration stepped up its campaign of blaming China for the coronavirus, with a top aide suggesting Beijing sent airline passengers to spread the infection worldwide.“The virus was spawned in Wuhan province, patient zero was in November,” White House trade adviser Peter Navarro said on ABC’s “This Week.” “The Chinese, behind the shield of the World Health Organization, for two months hid the virus from the world and then sent hundreds of thousands of Chinese on aircraft to Milan, New York and around the world to seed that.”For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
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Trulieve Cannabis (CSE:TRUL) shares have had a really impressive month, gaining 36%, after some slippage…
(Bloomberg) — As successful as the Federal Reserve has been propping up corporate debt prices, the support is only temporary and distress will sweep through the credit markets when the central bank inevitably steps back, Howard Marks said.“Can the Fed keep it up forever?” Marks, the billionaire co-chairman of Oaktree Capital Group, said in a Bloomberg “Front Row” interview. “Those of us in the markets believe that stocks and bonds are selling at prices they wouldn’t sell at if the Fed were not the dominant force. So if the Fed were to recede, we would all take over as buyers, but I don’t think at these levels.”That, in a nutshell, is the dilemma for policy makers.Confronted by the worst economic collapse since the Great Depression, they’ve resorted to unprecedented means to keep big employers in business, including the March 23 announcement of two corporate-credit facilities with $750 billion of total spending power.The prospect of intervention on that scale sparked an immediate surge in demand for both investment-grade and junk bonds. Now that the program has started buying, it’s unclear what happens when — and if — the funding runs out.Some investors think the prices of stocks and bonds are justified by the promise of endless central bank liquidity. In other words: You can’t fight the Fed.Marks disagrees. He expects a slow and halting recovery from the coronavirus pandemic and said “there will be plenty” of debt defaults and bankruptcies when corporate borrowers start running out of cash in the months ahead.“There are large, highly levered companies and investment vehicles that the government and Fed rescue program is not likely to reach and take care of,” he said.Already, Neiman Marcus Group Inc., Stage Stores Inc., Avianca Holdings SA and J. Crew Group Inc. are among the bankruptcies hastened by the economic fallout from Covid-19. In the bond market, some 540 issuers are still trading at yields that suggest a high probability of default, though that number is down from almost 900 in late March.One example of the Fed’s efforts is Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd. Even though cruises have been halted during the pandemic and revenue has shriveled to almost zero, the company was able to sell $3.3 billion of secured debt at a yield of about 11%.“It’s what happens in a market which is, I would say, artificially supported by Fed buying,” Marks said.‘Potemkin Market’In the 1980s, Marks became one of the first investors to specialize in beaten-down bonds. Oaktree, the Los Angeles-based firm he co-founded with Bruce Karsh, is now trying to raise $15 billion for what would be the biggest-ever fund to invest in distressed debt.Oaktree was a “very active buyer” when credit markets were swooning in mid-March, but has pulled back since the Fed announced it would intervene, Marks said. While the central bank has committed to buying investment-grade bonds and debt recently downgraded to junk, it hasn’t extended that support to less-creditworthy issuers.“They could do that,” Marks said. “And in theory, if they bought aggressively, they could make all the markets rise. Now everyone would know that that’s a Potemkin market, a fake, and the minute they stopped things would collapse.”In one of his recent memos to clients, Marks quoted a saying: “Capitalism without bankruptcy is like Catholicism without hell.” In the interview, he said he worries that Fed support for the credit market will result in moral hazard — the likelihood that those who escape the consequences for reckless behavior will be reckless again.That’s not to say he objects to Fed support for the economy.“Thank God that it did what it did,” he said. “Just because something has unforeseeable negative consequences, that doesn’t mean it was a mistake.”For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
Hertz, backed by billionaire investor Carl Icahn, has suffered a “sudden and dramatic negative impact” on its business due to the coronavirus crisis, which has crushed demand for rental cars as people cancel travel and stay at home. Hertz, which operates the Hertz, Dollar and Thrifty rental brands, said Stone replaced Kathryn Marinello, who will remain with the company in a consulting position for up to one year.
Yahoo Finance’s Brian Sozzi, Alexis Christoforous, and Brian Cheung recap Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell’s recent remarks on the economy’s road to recovery. Anyone researching Soligenix, Inc. (NASDAQ:SNGX) might want to consider the historical volatility of the share price…
A strange tweet by Tesla Inc. (NASDAQ: TSLA) CEO Elon Musk, has given rise to speculation that he may be veering to the right of the political spectrum.What Happened Musk, who is known to be a prolific user of Twitter, took to the platform on Sunday to declare, "Take the red pill."The red pill may be a reference to the 1999 movie "The Matrix," in which the protagonist, Neo, is faced with the choice of taking either a red or a blue pill. However, the red pill may also be Musk's way of indicating his willingness to adopt right-wing political ideology, according to Business Insider. Musk is a self-described "moderate."Replying to Musk's tweet, Ivanka Trump exclaimed, "Taken!"Why It Matters Ivanka is not the only Trump who has been tweeting in support of Musk lately. Last week her father, President Donald Trump, expressed agreement with Musk's determination to open his then shuttered Fremont, California factory.Musk has become increasingly vocal in his criticism of pandemic-driven regulations since his run-in with Alameda County authorities, who had ordered Tesla's factory to remain shut, citing a prevailing health order. The SpaceX founder's criticism is being interpreted by some as a shift towards conservatism.Musk threatened to move production out of California and restarted the factory in defiance of health orders. The Fremont manufacturing facility has since been given the go-ahead to open after Tesla representatives held talks with county officials.Price Action On Friday, Tesla shares closed 0.52% lower at $799.17.See more from Benzinga * Uber To Cut Thousands Of Jobs Again * More Than 25 US Apple Stores To Reopen, 100 Now Open Around The World * Saudi Arabia On A Pandemic Bargain Hunt, Buys Shares in Facebook, Disney, Boeing, Others(C) 2020 Benzinga.com. Benzinga does not provide investment advice. All rights reserved.