Avie Schneider

Updated at 4:05 p.m. ET

U.S. stock indexes finished up Thursday as investors tried to absorb the latest financial impacts of the coronavirus pandemic.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average rebounded, rising 188 points — about 1% — to 20,087. The S&P 500 index gained nearly 0.5% and the Nasdaq surged 2.3%.

Updated at 10:13 a.m. ET

New claims for unemployment benefits climbed to 281,000 last week as the coronavirus pandemic shuttered businesses and left people out of work, the Labor Department said Thursday. It was the highest level since Sept. 2, 2017, when they totaled 299,000.

Updated at 5:13 p.m. ET

The Dow Jones Industrial Average plummeted more 1,334 points, or 6.3%, Wednesday after President Trump announced new emergency steps to deal with the coronavirus pandemic, including suspending foreclosures and evictions until the end of April.

The Dow had been down more than 2,000 points earlier in the day, but later recovered some of its losses.

Updated at 4:05 p.m. ET

The Dow Jones Industrial Average surged Tuesday, a day after its stunning record plunge, as the White House and Federal Reserve unveiled massive stimulus measures to help the economy deal with the coronavirus pandemic.

The Dow closed up 1,049 points, or 5.2%. The S&P 500 index gained nearly 6%.

Updated at 4:21 p.m. ET

U.S. stock indexes fell sharply Monday, a day after the Federal Reserve aggressively cut interest rates to near zero in a bid to stop the economy from crashing. The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 2,997.20 points, or about 13%, as coronavirus measures rapidly expanded. The S&P 500 index lost nearly 12%.

The Dow, which closed at 20,188.52, has lost 31.7% since its record high Feb. 12 as the market plunges deeper into bear territory after an 11-year winning streak.

Updated at 5 a.m. ET on Monday

European shares dropped more than 8% on Monday, led by losses in Italy and France, the two countries hardest-hit by the coronavirus pandemic that has girdled the globe in recent weeks, infecting tens of thousands of people, severing supply chains and slowing commerce as people are forced to stay home.

In early trading, Italy's FTSE MIB, France's CAC 40 and Germany's DAX were all down more than 8%, with London's FTSE 100 just behind, dropping more than 7%.

Updated at 4:18 p.m. ET

It was a lucky Friday the 13th for Wall Street.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average soared 1,985 points, more than 9%, on the same day President Trump declared a national emergency to deal with the coronavirus pandemic. It closed at 23,185. The S&P 500 index also jumped more than 9%, closing at 2,711.

Nothing lasts forever — not even a stock market that keeps going up, up and up.

This week, just days after its 11-year anniversary, investors unceremoniously said goodbye to the longest-running bull market in history.

Then the bears took over.

Updated at 4:04 p.m. ET

The stock market has suffered a relentless, breathtaking drop — moving deeper into bear territory. Stocks fell so fast Thursday morning that it triggered a 15-minute halt in trading for the second time this week.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 2,352 points, or nearly 10% — the biggest one-day drop since 1987. The S&P 500 and the Nasdaq were each down more than 9%.

Updated at 5:18 p.m. ET

Major stock indexes plunged again on Wednesday, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down more than 20% from its peak in February. The meant that the blue chip index entered bear market territory, ending its 11-year winning streak.

The blue chip index fell 1,464 points, or nearly 5.9%. The S&P 500 slid 4.9% and the Nasdaq lost 4.7% — and put those indexes down 19.2% from their peaks.

What a difference a day makes.

After diving more than 2,000 points Monday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average regained some of its footing Tuesday, rising 1,167 points.

The blue chip index, the S&P 500 and Nasdaq rose nearly 5% after the market's worst day since 2008. The price of oil also soared, up 11% after losing 25% the day before.

Six minutes after trading began on the New York Stock Exchange on Monday, it was suddenly halted. That's when the S&P 500 index had plummeted 7% and marketwide circuit breakers kicked in. Trading resumed about 15 minutes later.

The marketwide halt was the first since the stock market crash of Oct. 27, 1997, when the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 554 points, or 7.2%.

Under market rules, circuit breakers kick in at three thresholds:

Updated at 4:39 p.m. ET

Stock indexes tumbled so fast Monday that trading on the New York Stock Exchange was halted temporarily for the first time since October 1997. The Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 2,013 points as fears grew over the economic impact of the coronavirus epidemic. The blue chip index fell nearly 7.8%, and the S&P 500 dropped 7.6%.

It was the worst day for the market since 2008, during the financial crisis.

Updated at 10:52 p.m. ET

Oil prices and stock indexes were in freefall Sunday after Saudi Arabia announced a stunning discount in oil prices — of $6 to $8 per barrel — to its customers in Asia, the United States and Europe.

Updated at 5:08 p.m. ET

Jack Welch, the larger-than-life chief executive who grew General Electric into an industrial powerhouse, has died. He was 84.

During his reign from 1981 to 2001, the company's market value skyrocketed to $410 billion from $12 billion. For his success in growing GE's value, Fortune magazine dubbed him "manager of the century" in 1999.

Welch aggressively bought and sold divisions, insisting GE rank near the top of any business in which it operated.

Updated at 10:12 a.m. ET

The long slide in the U.S. newspaper industry took another dramatic turn Thursday.

Updated at 10:10 p.m. ET

Who won Iowa?

Iowa's Democrats had hoped that a new smartphone app designed to collect the results of its caucuses would let the party get the count out to the public more quickly.

Updated at 1:18 p.m. ET

In 2018, Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman sent a WhatsApp message to the world's richest man. That message was behind a high-profile hack of Jeff Bezos' phone, according to a report commissioned by the Amazon CEO and reviewed by United Nations human rights experts.

Updated at 6:07 p.m. ET

Ending an era at the Internet's biggest search company, Google co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page are leaving their leadership roles and CEO Sundar Pichai will become chief executive of both Google and its parent company, Alphabet.

Page is stepping down as CEO of Alphabet, while Brin is resigning as its president. They will remain board members of Alphabet, a company that oversees not just Google but also research into artificial intelligence and self-driving cars.

Updated at 6:04 p.m. ET

Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey announced that his social media platform will stop running political ads, citing online ads' "significant risks to politics." Facebook has been criticized for allowing deceptive political ads.

"We've made the decision to stop all political advertising on Twitter globally. We believe political message reach should be earned, not bought," Dorsey tweeted late Wednesday afternoon.

He explained his reasons in a long thread of tweets.

Updated at 4:20 p.m. ET

Twenty-three U.S. senators are calling on the nation's top consumer protection agency to investigate a loan servicer for its role in a troubled student loan forgiveness program. The program is designed to help public service workers like teachers and police officers.

The loan servicer, the Pennsylvania Higher Education Assistance Agency, better known as FedLoan and PHEAA, is one of the entities that handles the Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program.

WeWork co-founder Adam Neumann is quitting as CEO amid problems with the workspace sharing company's efforts to go public. The company's valuation, once estimated at $47 billion, reportedly has dropped to less than $20 billion and its initial public offering has been delayed.

A federal appeals court Friday reinstated a lawsuit against Fox News and two other defendants over its coverage of the death of Seth Rich, a 27-year-old Democratic Party aide who was murdered in July 2016.

Updated at 4:13 p.m. ET

T. Boone Pickens, the legendary energy executive who became America's best-known oil tycoon, died Wednesday at age 91. The longtime Dallas resident, who suffered a series of strokes and head injuries in a 2017 fall, died of natural causes, said his spokesman, Jay Rosser.

Apple is entering the video-streaming race, taking on Netflix, Amazon, Disney and others with a monthly subscription of $4.99. The company also announced three new iPhones, even as their sales have been slowing.

Updated at 11:29 a.m. ET

Google and its YouTube subsidiary will pay $170 million to settle allegations that YouTube collected personal information from children without their parents' consent, the Federal Trade Commission said Wednesday.

Updated at 11:35 a.m. ET

Signaling the possibility of more interest-rate cuts, Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said the central bank will "act as appropriate" to sustain the economic expansion as the trade war with China takes a toll on global growth and the U.S. economy.

Updated at 5:18 p.m. ET

President Trump on Friday announced higher tariffs on goods from China, hours after Beijing said it will slap tariffs on $75 billion of autos and other U.S. goods. Earlier in the day, he "ordered" U.S. companies to stop doing business with China though it was unclear whether he had the power to do that.

Updated at 9:31 a.m. ET

The economy is slowing down, but it keeps creating jobs at a healthy pace. Employers added 164,000 jobs last month, as the unemployment rate held steady at 3.7%, the Labor Department said Friday. The jobless rate remains at a nearly 50-year low.

Analysts had expected about 165,000 jobs to be added in July and the unemployment rate to be 3.6%.