Retail sales rebounded in May after April’s record drop.

National retail sales rebounded in May as thousands of stores and restaurants reopened after lockdowns were lifted and federal stimulus checks and tax refunds fueled a burst of spending. But many of the stores and restaurants that welcomed back customers last month did so with fewer employees, reflecting a permanently altered retail landscape and an ominous sign for the economy as it tries to recover from the coronavirus pandemic.

Total sales, which include purchases in stores and online as well as money spent at bars and restaurants, rose 17.7 percent in May from the previous month, the Commerce Department said Tuesday. That followed a 14.7 percent drop in April, the largest monthly decline in nearly three decades of record-keeping, and an 8.3 percent decline in March.

Economists had expected a bounceback from April, when widespread business closures drove retail sales to their lowest level since 2012.

After more than a month of quarantine, May brought a tentative restart of brick-and-mortar retail across most of the country, with major chains like Macy’s and Gap reopening hundreds of stores. Some restaurants that had either closed or shifted their business to delivery and curbside pickup also reopened for in-person dining.

Driving some of the sales gains was warm weather, a sense of relief after weeks cooped up at home and optimism from some that the worst of the pandemic could be over. But they were also lifted by stimulus money — totaling $1,200 per recipient, plus $500 per child — that will run out in the coming months, with no indications that Congress intends to pass another round of assistance.

“I think a lot of it is lockdown fatigue,” said Beth Ann Bovino, chief U.S. economist at S&P Global. “I would caution not to be fooled by this large gain. We still have a long way to go in repairing the economy.”

Wall Street is set to follow global markets higher.

U.S. stock futures rallied as global markets jumped on Tuesday, one day after the Federal Reserve outlined the steps it would take to keep credit flowing to companies and as retail sales data showed a sharp bounceback in activity in May.

Futures for the S&P 500 signaled a gain of more than 2 percent Tuesday. European markets rose more than 3 percent after an even stronger rise in Asia, where stocks in Japan and South Korea ended roughly 5 percent higher.

Retail sales jumped nearly 18 percent in May, a stronger than expected recovery as stores slowly began to reopen and consumers began to spend again, the Commerce Department said. The report is another signal that the very worst of the economic damage from the pandemic could be over, though the rebound is off the sharpest decline in decades.

They were also reacting to a Bloomberg News report that the Trump administration was considering $1 trillion in infrastructure spending to help the economy rebound.

Signs of new coronavirus outbreaks, however, have also been front of mind for investors. U.S. stocks have mostly seesawed since late last week, after a 45 percent rally from their March lows.

Markets were cheered on Monday after the Fed announced that it would start to buy debt issued by individual companies. The S&P 500, which had been in negative territory, ended up about 1 percent as a result. The Fed’s plan is meant to ensure businesses have access to funding during the economic downturn.

The Fed chair, Jerome H. Powell, will testify before Congress Tuesday on the country’s economic outlook as he discusses the central bank’s next steps.

Airlines say they will step up mask enforcement.

After being criticized for not doing enough to make passengers wear masks, the nation’s biggest airlines said on Monday that they would get tougher on people who refused to cover their faces.

Airlines for America, a trade association, said that its members would take masks more seriously, including by not letting people without face coverings get on planes. But many big airlines have said that before, and passengers concerned about their health have pointed out that enforcement on board has often been lax.

“U.S. airlines are very serious about requiring face coverings on their flights,” Nicholas Calio, the chief executive of Airlines for America, said in a statement. “Face coverings are one of several public health measures recommended by the C.D.C. as an important layer of protection for passengers and customer-facing employees.”

According to the association, all of four of the largest U.S. airlines — Southwest Airlines, American Airlines, Delta Air Lines and United Airlines — have agreed to communicate their mask policies to customers before flying, reiterate the requirements in onboard announcements and enforce them when customers refuse to comply. Southwest issued a separate statement saying that it would “deny boarding” to passengers that refused to comply with its face covering requirement.

United said that, starting Thursday, any passenger who openly disregarded its rules could face a temporary travel ban on future flights. The airline, like others, grants exceptions for those with a medical condition or disability that prevents them from wearing a mask, as well as those who cannot put on or remove a mask themselves and small children. Customers may remove their masks to eat and drink.

The airline association said each airline would establish its own punishment for passengers who refuse to comply, “up to and including suspension of flying privileges.”

Airlines have so far been reluctant to publicly establish clear consequences for failure to wear face coverings, and many passengers have chided the companies on social media with photos of planes filled with people not wearing masks and sitting close to each other.

Strong rebound in oil demand is predicted, but airlines will lag.

The International Energy Agency forecast Tuesday that demand for oil, which has been slammed by the coronavirus pandemic, would rebound by a record amount next year but would still remain below 2019 levels largely because of what it called “an existential crisis” in commercial aviation.

Demand, especially among large oil importers like China and India, is already recovering rapidly from the April lows, the Paris-based group said. The agency forecast that demand will increase by 5.7 million barrels a day in 2021, but even this growth would not be enough for consumption to completely recover from the drop of 8.2 million barrels a day expected for 2020.

Most of the lingering shortfall is likely to be in aviation fuel, the group said, as travel restrictions designed to prevent the spread of the virus weigh heavily on long-distance flying.

The agency said in its Monthly Oil Report, published Tuesday, that the aviation recovery may depend on the discovery and dissemination of a vaccine for the virus, which it said might require another 12 to 18 months.

Overall, the agency’s analysis seemed to support the recovery in oil prices from their April lows. In the agency’s view, demand for oil may exceed output by the third quarter of this year if deep cuts by the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and Russia and well shutdowns in countries like the United States persist.

24 Hour Fitness closes 100 gyms and files for bankruptcy protection.

The fitness chain 24 Hour Fitness filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on Monday, after the coronavirus pandemic forced its clubs to shut for nearly two months.

“Put simply, the Covid-19 pandemic upended the debtors’ operating model, leaving the debtors without a source of revenue to fund their operations,” the filing stated.

The national gym chain said in its bankruptcy filing that it had permanently closed 100 locations across 14 states. But the chain is expected to re-emerge: It has secured $250 million in funding to reopen some of its clubs, and expects a majority of its remaining 300 locations to be open by the end of June.

The pandemic has been particularly devastating to the gym industry. Also on Monday, Town Sports International said that it was considering bankruptcy because of revenue losses as a result of the shutdown. The company, which owns about 200 gyms including New York Sports Club and Boston Sports Club, said in a regulatory filing that the “scope and duration of the interruption to our operations has substantially reduced our cash flow.”

Catch up: Here’s what else is happening.

• British employment data released Tuesday showed a sharp decline in the number of people on payrolls, but the overall unemployment rate for the February-March period remained steady, at 3.9 percent, as the country’s furlough program kept many people off the jobless rolls. Over 600,000 people were shed from payrolls between March and May, a 2.1 percent decline an the first drop after years of steady growth.

• The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences said on Monday that it would push back the next Oscars ceremony to April 25 from Feb. 28, citing the coronavirus pandemic. The postponement, the fourth since the Academy Awards were introduced in 1929, could prompt the Golden Globes and other entertainment award shows to recalibrate.

Reporting was contributed by Sapna Maheshwari, Michael Corkery, Stanley Reed, Mohammed Hadi, Niraj Chokshi, Gillian Friedman, Carlos Tejada and Brooks Barnes.