A sell-off in global risk assets has brought EU equities to almost three-month lows, with the pan-European STOXX 600 index falling 1.0% by 7.11 am GMT, hitting its lowest since late June, while stocks in Frankfurt, London and Paris went down between 0.6% and 1.0%.
Wall Street indexes also dipped overnight, led by technology stocks after US Federal Reserve officials demanded further government aid from the Congress.
France has in the meantime become the latest European country to reimpose curbs, with the government unveiling a map of coronavirus "danger zones" and giving the hardest-hit local authorities a short while to tighten restrictions or risk new, locally introduced lockdowns across the country.
Sectors such as travel and oil & gas fell about 2%, with the same trend shown by tech stocks, which likewise went down by 2%. The crisis has also dealt a blow to online payment systems, with company Adyen falling 2.6% after it said co-founder Arnout Schuijff would step down from its board of directors as of 1 January.
On Monday, the benchmark Canadian index TSX joined stock markets around the world in a new round of selling off, as surging cases of the coronavirus reignited concerns that the economic impact of the pandemic is still far from being sorted out.
The S&P/TSX Composite Index closed down 217 points or 1.3 per cent as health-care companies, energy companies, mining firms, banks and even tech enterprises were all significantly lower.
The downward trend began in Asia as soon as trading opened for this week, further accelerating in Europe and the US amid worries about the possibility of tougher COVID-induced restrictions. In New York, the broad S&P 500 slumped 38.41 points, or 1.2 per cent, while the Dow Jones closed down 509 points, or 1.8 per cent, after having at one point been as low as 942 points down.
