Stock market:- U.S. stock markets fell in late morning trading

U.S. stock markets fell in late morning trading Friday after government data suggested that the U.S. economy shed jobs faster than widely expected as the Covid-19 started to hit and deaths in New York saw the biggest one-day rise.

Stock market:- U.S. stock markets fell in late-morning trading

By 11:25 AM ET (1525 GMT), the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 370 points, or 1.7%, while the S&P 500 was down 1.4% and the Nasdaq Composite was off 1.3%.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics had said earlier that nonfarm employment in the U.S. fell by 701,000 within the month to mid-March, much more than the 100,000 drops expected.

Even those data are largely rendered meaningless by the record spike in jobless claims within the fortnight since the deadline for the BLS’s report. In those fortnights, some 10 million Americans have filed for unemployment benefits.

Later this morning, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said New York deaths from Covid-19 rose to 2935 from 2373.

Among individual stocks, the standout outperformer was Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA), which said after the bell on Thursday that it had delivered 88,400 cars in the first quarter. The company noted that the deliveries of its Model Y crossover SUV had begun in January and continued 'well ahead of schedule.' Tesla stock rose 7%.

Carnival (NYSE: CCL) shares rose 3% as the market digested the cruise line operator's mammoth refinancing earlier in the week. 

Oil producers were also within the spotlight again, as newswire reports seemed to show the makings of a worldwide agreement to chop oil supplies and rebalance a market that's struggling badly with oversupply thanks to the Covid-19 pandemic. 

The OPEC+ group of oil exporters, which incorporates Russia and Saudi Arabia, is about to carry a virtual meeting on Monday, while President Donald Trump is about to satisfy with representatives of the U.S. oil industry later Friday. Newswires reported a draft proposal from OPEC that Saudi Arabia was prepared to chop a minimum of 3 million barrels each day of production, and Russia 1.5 million if other producers like the U.S., Canada, and Brazil cut 2 million b/d.