SALT LAKE CITY — The coronavirus outbreak is cutting into the economy.
Global financial markets suffered Monday as the epidemic threatened international supply chains and companies warned the virus will prevent them from meeting sales goals.
The Center for Disease Control and Prevention says that more than 30 countries have confirmed cases of coronavirus disease in 2020 with 53 cases in the United States. Globally, the disease has killed more than 2,600 people, CNN reported Monday.
From fear to fall
Fears that the virus will affect international trade led to the fall of stocks in the Dow Jones, S&P 500 and international markets. Airline stocks and oil prices have also taken a hit.
- Dow Jones Industrial Average: Dropped more than 800 points, or 2.8%, which “puts it on track for its biggest one-day decline in six months,” The Wall Street Journal reported.
- Standard & Poor’s 500: Fell 90 points, or 2.7%, “with all 11 sectors posting declines.”
- Nasdaq Composite: Plunged 3.2%
- Elsewhere, South Korea’s KOSPI (down almost 3.9%), the United Kingdom’s FTSE 100 (down 3.3%), Germany’s DAX (down 4%) and France’s CAC40 (down 4%) were also hit hard, CNN reported.
- Brent crude — a benchmark for global oil exchange — fell 4.5% to $55.34 a barrel. The deepest fall in nearly five months, Forbes reported.
- Travel fears are hurting airline stocks. Delta and American Airlines dropped around 7% and 8.5% respectively, according to Forbes.
Experts explain
Financial experts attributed the markets’ rough day not just to fears of the disease, but to effects on global supply chains.
- “Not only are Chinese industrial hubs in lockdown, and derailing global supply chains, you now have the virus spreading very close to industrial hubs in Europe,” European economist Florian Hense of the Berenberg Bank said, according to The Wall Street Journal.
- “The interruption to business and supply chains is becoming more prevalent,” said senior investment strategist Charlie Ripley of Allianz Investment Management, who called the coronavirus “more of a pandemic problem,” Forbes reported.
- “A growing number of companies are warning that the coronavirus will prevent them from meeting sales or profit targets for the first three months of the year,” CNN Business reported Monday.
There are almost 79,000 confirmed cases of the coronavirus around the world, the World Health Organization reported Sunday, 77,000 of which are in China.
There are currently no cases of the coronavirus in the Utah, although some Utahns remain quarantined abroad with the disease.