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Wall Street ends January on heavy loss

Fears over the coronavirus revived, the Dow Jones closed down more than 2% to 28,256.03 points.

Wall Street finished sharply lower on Friday after the last session in January, amid mounting concerns over the new Chinese coronavirus.

The New York Stock Exchange’s star index, the Dow Jones Industrial Average, lost 2.09% to 28,256.03 points.

The Nasdaq lost 1.59% at 9,150.94 points, and the S&P 500 1.77% at 3,225.52 points.

For the month of January as a whole, the Dow Jones and the S&P 500 lost 0.99% and 0.19% respectively. The Nasdaq, on the other hand, rose 2.00%.

Concerns about the viral pneumonia epidemic intensified on Friday, as market participants attempted to assess the economic repercussions of this health crisis.

The United States has announced several emergency measures to prevent the import of the virus, including a ban on entry to non-Americans who have visited China in the past 14 days.

Earlier today, the three main American airlines (United Airlines, Delta Air Lines and American Airlines) announced that they would suspend their flights to China.

“What markets observe during epidemics is duration and direction. If new cases are detected in the United States, this will reinforce fears, “observes Quincy Krosby, of Prudential.

China reported 43 new deaths in 24 hours on Friday, for a total of 213 deaths. And the number of infected patients approaches 10,000 in mainland China (excluding Hong Kong and Macao).

Many cases have also been reported in other countries, including the United States.

On the New York Stock Exchange, the oil majors were particularly hard pressed. Exxon Mobil and Chevron, which also released their quarterly results before the opening, each lost about 4%.

Travel specialists like the online booking agency (-2.22%) and the cruise company Carnival (-2.73%) also declined.

Amazon shines

Against current market trends, Amazon displayed a radiant shape, its share climbing by 7.38%. The online retail giant posted much better results than expected in the last quarter of 2019, driven by a “record” holiday season.

At the close of Friday, the market value of Amazon exceeded 1,000 billion dollars, a symbolic threshold that the group had first crossed in September 2018 before falling below.

Among the indicators, economic activity in the Chicago region, with a strong manufacturing dominance, plunged into recession in January, reaching its lowest level in four years, according to the purchasing managers index of the ISM association published Friday.

Consumer confidence in the United States, on the other hand, improved slightly in January, contradicting analysts’ expectations, according to a final estimate from the University of Michigan survey released on Friday.

On the bond market, the 10-year rate on the American debt continued to fall around 9.45 p.m. GMT, at 1.50% against 1.586% the day before at the close.

The rate on 10-year US Treasuries has fallen sharply since the start of the year, raising fears that it may fall below that of 2-year bonds, which has also fallen significantly in recent weeks.

This phenomenon, known as a “yield curve reversal” is generally the leading indicator of a recession.

Among other values, IBM rose 4.34%. The IT group announced on Thursday that its managing director, Ginni Rometty, will leave his post in April and will be replaced by Arvind Krishna, vice president of the group’s cloud activity.

Caterpillar fell 2.97% after reporting pessimistic prospects for 2020 when it released its results, highlighting “uncertainties” in the global economy.

Video game publisher Electronic Arts, which reported somewhat disappointing revenue forecasts after Thursday’s close, lost 3.33%.

The American group of hygiene and household products Colgate-Palmolive, on the other hand, jumped 6.20% after having generated in the fourth quarter 2019 a turnover better than expected.

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