The strong effects of the coronavirus, declared yesterday as a pandemic by the World Health Organization (WHO), continue to wreak havoc on world markets, which once again had red numbers, in the world and in Colombia.
In the case of crude, affected by the covid-19 and by the pulse between Saudi Arabia and Russia, the price of the reference barrel WTI (Texas) closed this Wednesday with a fall of 4.02 percent, to $ 32.98 the barrel. In London, the barrel of Brent for delivery in May lost 3.8 percent to $ 35.79.
(It may interest you: Dollar exceeded $ 3,900 and sets new record for market tension)
This level places it at just $ 7.91 from the lowest price in the last 4 years, which occurred on January 20, 2016, in the last oil shock.
Meanwhile, the New York Stock Exchange had a new drop in a session clearly affected by the pandemic declaration, since the main indicator, the Dow Jones Industrials, closed with losses of 5.85 percent, standing at 25,553 points, in another volatile day marked by investors’ fear of the economic slowdown stemming from the coronavirus crisis.
To its turn, the Nasdaq, the index of shares of technology companies on the stock market, lost 4.70 percent to 7,952.05 units.
And pending the measures adopted today by the European Central Bank, in Spain, the Ibex 35, the stock exchange index dropped 0.34 percent and is trading at September 2012 levels, while London lost 1.4 per percent and Frankfurt, 0.35 percent.
In Colombia, due to the drop in crude oil and nervousness, the dollar jumped again, this time by 54 pesos, to reimpose a historical mark, with the official price at 3,835.15 pesos. Even at some point in the day on Wednesday, transactions were reached at more than 3,900 pesos, since the maximum price of the currency on the day was 3,908 pesos.
(Also read: Duque announces economic measures for coronavirus and dollar crisis)
And as in the world stock markets, the Latin American stock markets had another day in the red, as the Plaza de Buenos Aires contracted 4.30 percent; that of São Paulo, 7.64 percent; that of Mexico fell 2.24 percent; that of Santiago, 2.23 percent; that of Lima, 3.7 percent, while the Colombian Stock Exchange, in its Colcap index, fell 4.76 percent.
Ecopetrol’s stock fell 4.29 percent to 2,230 pesos, while the most hit was Avianca Holdings, which dropped 13.21 percent to 1,215 pesos.
ECONOMY AND BUSINESS
With information from agencies
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