Bringing the week’s grand total losses to more then 3,500 points, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell by 357.28 points. The S&P 500 plummeted by 24.54 and the Nasdaq Composite posted a gain of .89 points.
Friday’s coronavirus-fueled losses further plunged US stocks into a correction territory - a 10% drop from recent highs - and placed the market on track for its worst drop since the 2008 financial crisis.
“This unfortunately is the perfect storm,” Doug Cohen, managing director at Athena Capital Advisors, told the Wall Street Journal. “This is not something out of a standard economic textbook.”
Overnight, both New Zealand and Nigeria confirmed their very first COVID-19 cases, and South Korea registered 571 new cases. China also updated its figures and revealed that 327 new cases were recorded.
Outside the US, Asian markets are also taking quite the hit. Both Japan’s Nikkei 225 and South Korea’s KOSPI index closed Friday more than 3% down. China's Shenzhen Component Index wrapped the day with nearly 5% losses, and the Shanghai Stock Exchange took a 3.71% dive. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index reported a drop of 2.42%.
“The timing of this was just the worst with respect to investor sentiment being elevated,” Doug Ramsey, chief investment officer at The Leuthold Group, told CNBC, referring to the coronavirus outbreak. “I’m not sure that the market has really priced in the potential economic impact of this.”
In recent days, coronavirus fears have prompted several companies, including tech giants Apple, Microsoft and PayPal, to issue earnings and revenue notices regarding downgraded production forecasts.
Taking note of the current atmosphere, investment banking giant Goldman Sachs further added to the growing market worries on Thursday when it revised its earnings estimates for 2020 and predicted no growth for US companies for the year because of the outbreak.
At present, more than 83,800 coronavirus cases have been confirmed, according to the Johns Hopkins University Center for Systems Science and Engineering. Over 78,800 of the cases have been confirmed in mainland China, followed by South Korea with 2,337 cases. A total of 2,867 deaths from the virus have been officially documented.
