The DJIA closed out the week with a fall of 256.50, and the S&P 500 dropped by 51.57 points. The Nasdaq Composite wrapped up the day with a loss of 162.98 points.
Friday’s closing figures add to a two-week whirlwind for Wall Street, which has experienced gains of more than 1,000 points twice amid several days’ worth of massivelosses on the trading floor.
Andrew Slimmon, senior portfolio manager at Morgan Stanley Investment Management, told CNBC that “markets have not done well on Fridays because we are all expecting the situation to worsen over the weekend.”
Despite the US government’s repeated attempts to quell fears over the increasing amounts of confirmed COVID-19 cases and associated fatalities, efforts such as cuts to interest rates and emergency spending bills, have not proven to be sufficient. The Labor Department revealed Friday in a newly released report that the US economy had exceeded its expectations and added a total of 273,000 jobs in February; however, the news did little to swing trading figures into the green.
As of Friday afternoon, COVID-19 coronavirus infections in the US have led to the deaths of at least 15 individuals - 14 of which were recorded in Washington state and one in California.
According to data from the Johns Hopkins Center for Systems Science and Engineering, there have been more than 100,600 confirmed COVID-19 cases globally, and more than 3,400 deaths. Recently, in the US, new cases have emerged in Maryland, Pennsylvania and Colorado, among other states.