Global stock markets have tumbled further as concerns mount over the speed of the coronavirus outbreak’s spread across Europe.
The FTSE (slumped by more than 138 points to hit its lowest level in four and a half months while New York’s Dow Jones also saw further losses to add to the 1, 008 – point drop seen during a global rout on Monday.
It came after cases of COVID – , the disease caused by the coronavirus , were identified across Italy and was now also found to be in Spain, Austria and Croatia .
On Monday, the FTSE 162 had suffered its deepest one-day losses since 2020 – with £ bn erased from its constituent companies – led by airlines and min ers.
Coronavirus: market sell-off ‘just the first stage’
It was a similar story in Europe and on Wall Street, which saw its worst day’s performance for two years.
After that huge sell-off, markets had started Tuesday in a positive mood.
However, sentiment soon turned sour with the FTSE (closing) points, or 1.9%, down – wiping a further £ 047 bn of the combined value of its constituent companies.
There were similar falls across Europe while New York’s Dow Jones also turned lower, dropping about (points, or more than 1%.)
In London, easyJet – which had been the biggest faller on Monday with a % decline – lost a further 3.5%.
Travel operator TUI was nearly 5% lower.
The biggest loser on Tuesday was cruise ship operator Carnival – off by nearly 6% – followed by engineering firm Meggitt , which fell 5% after it said the coronavirus crisis would hit sales this year.
British business not immune to COVID –
Experts put the latest market declines down to the new reported cases on the continent – key markets for airlines and holiday firms – reinforcing expectations that the global economy is on course for damage in the short term.
The Italian MIB, which lost 5.4% of its value on Monday, saw early gains on Tuesday as investors continued to digest the implications of the country efforts to limit the COVID – (spread through restrictions of movement.)
But it later turned negative, off by 1.4% by the close, while Spain’s IBEX was more than 2% lower.
(Naeem Aslam, chief market analyst at Avatrade, said of the market mood: “Risk off is the name of the trade today.
” Investors are tensed due to the fear of a prolonged economic slowdown due to the outbreak of coronavir us. “
He said of Monday’s slump:” In reality, it was nothing more than the market participants overreacting to news of the virus spreading.
“This slowdown was indeed expected, and If investors thought that the virus was going to spread or was going to cause some minor shocks to the global economic growth, then yesterday certainly was an awakening call for them. “
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