Finance, investment and tax-related legislation

The Senate and House passed bipartisan legislation to help nonprofits remain financially viable during the COVID-19 pandemic.

With a resurgence of the coronavirus threatening a nascent rebound of the U.S. economy, the White House and Congress are under increased pressure to come to terms on another round of stimulus.

Top Democrats in the House and Senate are backing a measure that would deny coronavirus aid to companies that moved their official headquarters offshore to avoid U.S. taxes.

The House voted Thursday to give small businesses financially strapped by the COVID-19 crisis more flexibility to spend forgivable loans for payrolls and expenses from the government’s popular Paycheck Protection Program.

Under the Senate legislation, if a company can’t show that it is not under control of a foreign government, or the PCAOB isn’t able to audit the company for three consecutive years to determine that is the case, the company’s securities would be banned from the exchanges.

The Senate overwhelmingly approved legislation Wednesday that could lead to Chinese companies such as Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. and Baidu Inc. being barred from listing on U.S. stock exchanges amid increasingly tense relations between the world’s two largest economies.

The measure, passed 208-199, would give cash-strapped states and local governments more than $1 trillion while providing most Americans with a new round of $1,200 checks

Republicans universally rejected a $3 trillion stimulus measure drafted by House Democrats to bolster the U.S. economy, but the draft plan has the seeds for an eventual, smaller compromise.

House Democrats proposed a $3 trillion virus relief bill Tuesday, combining aid to state and local governments with direct cash payments, tax breaks, expanded unemployment insurance and food stamp spending as well as a list of progressive priorities like funds for voting by mail and the troubled U.S. Postal Service.

A bipartisan group of lawmakers introduced legislation Wednesday to enable small businesses to deduct their expenses even if they have received a loan from the federal government’s Paycheck Protection Protection Program that was later forgiven.