United Airlines Warns Of Possible Furloughs
NEWTON: United Airlines is warning 36,000 workers they may be furloughed or laid off later this year. That's nearly half the company's frontline workforce including pilots, flight attendants, gate agents and maintenance workers. Notices went out on Wednesday since U.S. law requires a 60-day heads up on mass layoffs. The airline says it's operating only a quarter of its flights compared to last year. I want to bring in CNN's John Defterios live this hour in Abu Dhabi. I mean, there's still a lot of economic pain to come and yet market, some of them incredibly resilient. And the one that has standout in -- standout in Asia is Shanghai.</s>JOHN DEFTERIOS, CNN BUSINESS EMERGING MARKETS EDITOR: Yes, certainly it has, Paula. This has been on a tear for the last week. And it's not just about the economic recovery in China and how that plays into earnings, but a sense of national pride as well. We even had a Chinese owned state equities journal suggesting that it would give a nice diplomatic lift to Xi Jinping in this rebuilding effort over the course of 2020. And that certainly has driven a 17 percent gain over the last month, and half of that coming in the last week alone. And China feeling a little bit bolder as well. Wang Yi, the foreign minister today in Beijing was suggesting that the U.S. has to come up with a different narrative because bilateral relations between Washington and Beijing haven't been this bad for 40 years. And you can have a long list to look at here. Huawei, the telecoms operator, the telecoms equipment makers ZTE, TikTok, the list is long. And even with the security law by China in Hong Kong, there's a report out in the last 24 hours that the U.S. wants to undermine that dollar pegged to the Hong Kong currency, which has been around since 1983. A reminder here for China, though back in 2015, we had the same kind of nationalist tone in the stock market. And Paula, it ended in tears. This is a market that has been on a tear, but indeed, it seems to be mixed up with other motivations here for China globally.</s>NEWTON: Yes. Certainly, a lot of people on a bubble watch with that. Now, in about just under six hours from now, we will get the latest weekly jobless claims for the United States. And still some of those figures just stubbornly high.</s>DEFTERIOS: Indeed, Paula. And many of our viewers probably wonder why are you covering this every week. It's because we had this kind of flatlining of a very high number. Let's take a look at the expectations. We're looking at 1.37 million expected for the last week in terms of filing. That's about seven times higher than what we saw prior to the pandemic. And the trend line was coming down, Paula, and that was kind of the positive coming out of it. When you see the cases surging again with regards to the pandemic, you have to expect they're going to go higher. There's reoccurring numbers here, nearly 19 million. That means people couldn't find work, and they're coming back time and again to get the unemployment benefits from the U.S. government. You talked about United Airlines, right? This is a classic case in point of the frontline. Airlines, hospitality, hotels, restaurants, lots of layoffs. You're looking at a furloughing of 36,000 workers and that's even after the government has put up billions of dollars to provide those salaries. They're saying, after those salaries end, we may have to -- have to furlough those 36,000 people. Extraordinary numbers, Paula, and this will drive up the unemployment rate probably in the third and fourth quarter.</s>NEWTON: Yes. And such a good reminder that we are so far from recovery of this global economy. John Defterios for us in Abu Dhabi, I really appreciate it. Brooks Brothers, the men's clothing retailer known for addressing Wall Street bankers has now filed for bankruptcy protection. The pandemic played a role of course, but as CNN's Clare Sebastian explains, changing tastes and the 200-year-old company, it all added up to a tailor-made fall.</s>CLARE SEBASTIAN, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, the destruction wrought by the Coronavirus pandemic on U.S. retail shows no sign of letting up. Now, another storied American brand Brooks Brothers, which claims the title of America's oldest clothing retailer has been forced to seek bankruptcy protection. The company is more than 200 years old. It prides itself on having dressed 40 U.S. presidents everyone from Abraham Lincoln, to John F. Kennedy. But it really suffered during the Coronavirus pandemic and not just because of the obvious, the store closures, the huge collapse in retail traffic that we saw in the first few months, but also because of a shift that was already underway. People addressing more casually, particularly in office setting. Pinstripe suits and button-down shirts are no longer the uniform. And Brooks Brothers was really on the wrong side of that. And especially now that we see so many people working from home, that isn't going to change. So, the company says it wants to stay in business. It has $75 million in financing to get it through bankruptcy, and it's looking actively for a buyer. Clare Sebastian, CNN, New York.</s>NEWTON: Businesses and beaches in Havana meantime have reopened after a lockdown that lasted more than three months. The government says it has nearly eliminated the virus there but that doesn't mean Cuba is welcoming tourists just yet. CNN'S Patrick Oppmann takes a closer look.</s>PATRICK OPPMANN, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: The doors are open again, even if it's not business as usual at Havana's El Cafe. Cuba was on lockdown for more than three months. But following a massive countrywide effort to bring the Coronavirus under control, the government is now easing restrictions, allowing businesses like this one to reopen. Staff at restaurants like El Cafe have to wear masks, rearrange the tables to allow social distancing, and sterilize the hands of every customer that comes in. Owner Nelson says that after four years serving some of Havana's best coffee and all-day breakfast, he's starting from scratch.</s>NELSON RODRIGUEZ TAMAYO, CUBAN RESTAURANT OWNER: It was completely in the saucer like collapse. And I go down and I feel like I start again the business.</s>OPPMANN: While hard hit economically by the Coronavirus, Cuba's program of extensive contact tracing, isolating the sick, and closing borders paid off. Health officials say there are now less than a few dozen active cases of Coronavirus on the island of 11 million people. On the first day the beach reopened, Cubans swam in the pristine blue waters that have been tantalizing forbidden to them all these weeks. It's been really good for me and my family to get refreshed, get some air and some sun, Michel says. But it's also important to maintain the hygiene and safety measures. That will be crucial to preventing a resurgence of cases and allowing the island to fully reopen. Havana is in stage one of recovery. And it won't be until stage three that the city's airport once again reopens to regular commercial flights. This is the Malecon Seawall, Havana's couch Cubans called, because everyone comes out here to sit on it. But for months it was eerily empty, off limits. Now that people are permitted to come back out here, life does feel like it's returning to normal. But there's still that strange sensation of being on an island that is almost entirely cut off from the rest of the world. For the time being, only hotels on five keys, small islands off the coast of Cuba are open to foreign visitors to keep further infection from spreading to the mainland. Both guests and hotel workers will be regularly tested health officials say. So for the time being, the rest of the island is inaccessible to the tourists who Nelson estimates made up 80 percent of his clientele before the outbreak.</s>TAMAYO: Were going to be more creative and I need to -- I will enjoy more different things, focusing other customer.</s>OPPMANN: Cubans have endured hurricanes, economic sanctions, and near economic collapse. And now the first wave of Coronavirus, even if this isn't a full recovery, the hope is that this new normal will last. Patrick Oppmann, CNN Havana.</s>NEWTON: Next on CNN NEWSROOM, the mystery over the SAT after Donald Trump's niece claimed he paid someone to take his high school exam. Internet sleuths got busy trying to track down the supposed test taker.