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Thursday, 28 March 2024

Stocks slide as hopes for virus crisis exit fade

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Stocks slide as hopes for virus crisis exit fade
Stocks slide as hopes for virus crisis exit fade

Global stocks turned negative again Wednesday as hopes waned for an early end to the global crisis in key markets.

Julian Satterthwaite reports.

So much for hopes that the worldwide crisis could be peaking.

Global stocks turned negative again Wednesday (April 8) as traders took in the latest evidence.

That included a record death toll the day before in the U.S., and a doubling in new cases in China.

Most Asian indexes closed in the red as a result.

Hong Kong's Hang Seng fell over 1%.

Japan's Nikkei was the exception, gaining over 2%.

Markets welcomed Tokyo's decision to declare a state of emergency and step up action against the outbreak.

No such positivity in Europe though, where key indexes all fell from the open.

The regional Stoxx 600 dropped over 1% in early trade, snapping two days of sharp gains.

Shares in Tesco dropped 4% after the UK supermarket said the crisis would cost it over $1 billion.

Big UK insurers tumbled after they scrapped dividends to preserve cash.

Aviva was down as much as 9%.

Fresh signs of broader economic pain too.

Germany's leading economic institutes said Wednesday that the country's economy would probably shrink almost 10% in the second quarter.

That's more than twice as bad as the early stages of the global financial crisis a decade ago.

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