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| - Wall Street stocks were mostly lower Friday afternoon in volatile trading as more of the US economy shuts down in response to the coronavirus outbreak. New York Governor Andrew Cuomo ordered non-essential businesses to close and banned all gatherings, a dramatic escalation of mitigation steps after the nation's most-populous state, California, on Thursday directed its 40 million residents to stay at home. Near 1710 GMT, the Dow Jones Industrial Average stood at 20,038.41, down 0.2 percent. The broad-based S&P 500 dropped 0.6 percent to 2,395.47, while the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite Index climbed 0.3 percent to 7,169.77. Economists are slashing their forecasts by the day. IHS Markit now sees a contraction of 13 percent in the second quarter after projecting a 5.4 percent decline just four days ago. A note from Goldman Sachs warned of an "unprecedented surge in layoffs," citing data from US states, and a massive decline in revenues in many industries. The US Federal Reserve announced yet another new initiative to pump funds into the economy through a program to inject liquidity in state and municipal money markets. US senators began critical negotiations over a $1 trillion emergency stimulus package to help Americans ravaged by the coronavirus, with Republicans seeking rapid passage while Democrats push for stronger worker protections. A proposal unveiled late Thursday includes onetime "recovery rebates" of up to $1,200 for adults earning under $99,000 annually, and hundreds of billions of dollars in loan guarantees to industries hard hit by the crises including airlines and small businesses. jmb/cs
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