Bitcoin soared above $50,000 for the first time on Tuesday after jumping almost 75 percent so far this year as heavyweight companies back the world's most popular virtual currency.

Saudi Arabia will stop doing business with foreign companies with regional headquarters outside the kingdom starting in 2024, state media said Monday, in a move aimed at boosting investment amid high unemployment.

Russian officials are preparing new relief measures for the business sector, which has received little state support since the start of the pandemic, a pro-Kremlin newspaper reported Monday.

Global stock markets and oil prices soared on Monday, boosted by progress on Covid vaccinations and increasing chances of a vast U.S. stimulus, dealers said.

They were omnipresent on the streets of New York day and night, as emblematic of the Big Apple as the Empire State Building or Yankees caps. But the pandemic has made yellow taxis scarce and facing an uncertain future.

On a February morning in a parking lot near La Guardia Airport, a few dozen of the yellow cabs patiently queue in the freezing cold to catch a fare from one of the terminals.

Israeli environmentalists are warning that a UAE-Israeli oil pipeline deal threatens unique Red Sea coral reefs and could lead to "the next ecological disaster." 

Asian markets rallied again Monday, extending a global advance after another record on Wall Street as traders were cheered by the prospect of a huge new US stimulus as well as further falls in coronavirus infection and death rates.

Since the start of the coronavirus pandemic, crowds have grown at the Martha and Mary Convent in central Moscow.

Rejecting an emergency appeal, U.S. Supreme Court justice Stephen Breyer has cleared the way for the extradition to Japan of two Americans accused of helping former Renault-Nissan boss Carlos Ghosn flee the Asian nation.

Markets fell in Asia on Friday in holiday-thinned trade with investors awaiting developments in US stimulus talks, while bitcoin hit a new record as it crept towards $50,000.