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The decrease in the rate surprised forecasters and emboldened President Trump. But economists cautioned that joblessness levels are still worse than any time since the Depression era.
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 The coronavirus has cost millions of Americans their jobs, but the pandemic has been particularly painful and deadly for African-Americans.
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 (Bloomberg) -- OPEC agreed to a one-month extension of its record output cuts after adopting a more stringent approach to ensuring members don't break their production pledges.The deal will underpin the oil market recovery, easing the financial pain felt by resource-dependent emerging economies, shale explorers in Texas, and blue-chip companies like Royal Dutch Shell Plc.It's a victory for Saudi Arabia and Russia, who put a destructive price war behind them to successfully cajole Iraq, Nigeria and other laggards to fulfill their obligations. The two leaders of OPEC showed that they intend to keep a close watch on the oil market, meeting every month to assess the evolving balance between supply and demand amid an uncertain economic recovery from the global pandemic.After a video conference lasting several hours on Saturday, delegates said all nations had signed off on a new deal for a production cut of 9.6 million barrels a day next month. That's 100,000 barrels a day lower than the reduction in June because Mexico will end its supply constraints, but a tighter limit than the 7.7 million barrels a day set for July in the group's previous agreement, they said. In addition, the approved communique states that any member that doesn't implement 100% of its production cuts in May and June will make extra reductions from July to September to compensate for their failings.Those promises are a particular vindication for the Saudi Energy Minister Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman, who has consistently pushed fellow mem
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 The big risk with the latest jobs report is if it turns out to be a "head fake" says Mohamed El-Erian, chief economic advisor at Allianz.
"That's the nightmare scenario," El-Erian told Yahoo Finance after the US unexpectedly added 2.5 million jobs last month states started re-opening their economies and easing COVID-19 shelter in place measures.
"The big risk is...that this is a head fake, a major head fake that we are picking up the impact of both data distortions and policy distortions," said El-Erian.
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Protesters planned to take to the streets across the U.S. Saturday for the 12th consecutive day of demonstrations, with calls on social media for one million people at the White House and other Washington, D.C., landmarks, amid continued demands for justice-system reform sparked by the killing of George Floyd while in police custody.
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Stocks close sharply Friday after the U.S. May jobs report showed a surprise 2.5 million jump in payrolls and a drop in the unemployment rate to 13.3% as businesses began to reopen from the COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns.
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 The U.S. economy added 2.5M jobs in May as the U.S. economy reopened businesses shuttered by the coronavirus pandemic. 8 million job losses were forecast.
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A monthly job report published Friday has shown signs of strength in the labor market. Unemployment has declined and employers have created millions of new jobs in May.
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 U.S. stock indexes surged higher on Friday, adding to already sharp gains in the morning after a report on employment in the U.S. showed an unexpected rise in jobs and the rate of unemployment fell rather than rose as had been feared. The report showed that 2.5 million jobs were added last month and the unemployment rate fell to 13.3% from 14.7% in April. Economists had predicted the official unemployment rate will climb to 19% in May, a MarketWatch survey showed. Friday's nonfarm-payroll also was expected to show that 7.25 million U.S. jobs were lost in May, after 20 million were lost in April due to the COVID-19 pandemic. "The US unemployment rate has shocked everyone because the number was much lower than the market expectation," wrote Naeem Aslam, chief market strategist at AvaTrade, in a note after the report was released. "Speculators were whispering for 20%. This a mind-blowing number and shows that the economy is improving," he wrote. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was 900 points, or 3.4%, higher at 27,178, those for the S&P 500 index climbed 2.7% at 3,196, while the Nasdaq Composite climbed 1.9%% at 9,795. The move for equities on Friday comes after the Dow ended 11.93 points, or less than 0.1%, higher on Thursday at 26,281.82. The fourth straight gain matches a similar streak of wins for the blue-chip index ended April 27, according to FactSet data. Meanwhile, the S&P 500 fell 10.52 points, or 0.3%, to close at 3,112.35 and the Nasdaq Composite Index finished 67.10 points, or 0.7%, lower to wrap up the session at 9,615.81, putting the index about 2.1% from its Feb.
Market Pulse Stories are Rapid-fire, short news bursts on stocks and markets as they move. Visit MarketWatch.com for more information on this news.
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 The U.S. economy added 2.5M jobs in May as the U.S. economy reopened businesses shuttered by the coronavirus pandemic. 8 million job losses were forecast.
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President Donald Trump on Friday celebrated the return of 2.5 million jobs to the U.S. economy in May, and went on the attack against Democrats as surveys show him trailing behind Joe Biden among voters in key states.
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