Bloomberg - Evening Briefing - Hopes for a soft landing

U.S. hiring advanced at a robust pace in April, with nonfarm payrolls rising 428,000 in a broad-based advance that matched the gains of March, a Labor Department report showed Friday. The unemployment rate held at 3.6% and average hourly earnings rose, albeit at a more moderate pace from a month earlier. The data showed average hourly earnings climbing only 0.3%. As Wall Street hopes for signs that inflation will slow, the jury is out on whether April’s wage growth is the beginning of sustained moderation or just a temporary break. “The ‘glass-half-full’ view,” according to Bloomberg Economics, “would say the odds for the Fed to engineer a soft landing have just increased.” —David E. Rovella

Bloomberg is tracking the coronavirus pandemic and the progress of global vaccination efforts.

Russia is continuing its so-far failed effort to fully take the Ukrainian port city of Mariupol, as hundreds of trapped fighters defend a sprawling steel plant there. At the same time, Ukrainian forces are reportedly launching a counterattack in the northeast. While fighting on the wider eastern front grinds on, the next phase of the war may be at sea. Kremlin-friendly leader Viktor Orban of Hungary has publicly attacked the European Union’s effort to stop using Russian oil, putting the deal at risk despite being a beneficiary of proposed exemptions. In London, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said “Ukraine could be tomorrow’s East Asia” as he announced additional sanctions on Russia, including freezing the assets of more individuals and halting exports to more organizations. In what may have been a message to Beijing, the Pentagon said Thursday that the war and the billions of dollars in weapons the U.S. is sending to Ukraine won’t diminish the attention paid to the Indo-Pacific region—including Taiwan.

A Ukrainian soldier wears an angel ornament given to him by his daughter in Sloviansk, in eastern Ukraine, on April 29. Photographer: Yasuyoshi Chiba/AFP

The Biden Administration’s plan to buy crude to refill strategic reserves may be a signal to U.S. drillers that there will be a market for more supply even if demand slumps.

As much of the world acts as if the coronavirus pandemic is over, at least a half-million children in the U.S. are struggling with the mysterious disease known as long Covid. And far from being over, U.S. Centers for Disease Control & Prevention data now show the U.S. to be entering a seventh wave, currently averaging 67,000 new cases, 2,200 hospital admissions and 340 deaths each day. Meanwhile in Japan, officials are set to experiment with opening borders to small groups of vaccinated foreign tourists as soon as this month.

China has ordered central government agencies and state-backed corporations to replace foreign-branded personal computers with domestic alternatives within two years, marking one of Beijing’s most aggressive efforts so far to eradicate key overseas technology from within its most sensitive organs.

Shopify’s president appealed to investors to focus on the company’s growing customer base as its stock dropped Friday to a two-year low. Here’s your markets wrap.

Shopify’s Harley Finkelstein Photographer: Christinne Muschi/Bloomberg

Cathie Wood’s famous faith in Elon Musk doesn’t appear to extend to his potential leadership of Twitter. Funds managed by Wood’s Ark Investment Management were already selling the social-media platform this year before the Tesla co-founder struck a deal to take Twitter private. On Thursday, Wood moved to dump the rest.

A bird flu virus that’s sweeping across the U.S. is rapidly becoming the country’s worst outbreak, having spurred the culling of more than 37 million chickens and turkeys. In Iowa, millions of animals in vast barns are suffocated in high temperatures or with poisonous foam. In Wisconsin, lines of dump trucks have taken days to collect masses of bird carcasses and pile them in unused fields. Neighbors have to live with the stench.

Chickens at a farm in Gonzales, Texas. Photographer: Mary Kang/Bloomberg

• Ex-Trump official draws line from U.S. insurrection to Putin’s war.
• Musk’s fixer is quietly tending to the world’s biggest fortune.
• Microfinance was supposed to help the developing world. Guess what.
• That advice about resisting the temptation to look at your 401(k)? Take it.
• Amazon fires managers of a New York City warehouse that unionized.
• Corn and soybeans sink with better U.S. planting weather ahead.
• Marketers are discovering that Mother’s Day isn’t fun for everyone.

Progressive rock pioneer Pink Floyd is exploring a sale of its recorded music catalog, which includes “Dark Side of the Moon,” one of the best-selling albums in history. The U.K. group is looking to capitalize on what’s been a frothy market for music rights. Bob Dylan recently sold his recordings to Sony Music in a deal estimated to be worth more than $150 million, and deals for songwriting catalogs have eclipsed $300 million.

Pink Floyd’s “Dark Side of the Moon” Photographer: Reading Eagle vi/MediaNews Group RM

Bloomberg New Economy Gateway Latin America: The region is fast embracing tech-based innovation. Will the emerging digital economy widen inequality or create more opportunity? Government and business leaders will gather May 18-19 in Panama to address Latin America's prospects for inclusive growth in education, jobs, transportation infrastructure, fintech, clean energy and healthcare. Learn more here and get exclusive alerts on how to watch the livestream.