New Virus In South Africa: Worldwide Financial Markets Have Fallen

Nikki Attkisson | Last Updated : November 29, 2021

As a result of the European Union’s recommendation to ban aviation travel from southern Africa due to the discovery of a rapidly spreading coronavirus strain, global stocks and oil prices fell Friday afternoon. A 2.4 percent drop followed an exceptionally big 3.3 percent drop in London’s benchmark index Tokyo’s benchmark index. Shanghai, Frankfurt, and Hong Kong were among the cities that saw a reduction in their population. On Wall Street, the futures contracts fell.

Worldwide Financial Markets Have Fallen

Some European countries have already stepped up anti-virus regulations due to an uptick in the number of cases in their own nation this week. Both Austria and Italy implemented a 10-day lockdown for anyone who hadn’t been vaccinated. The federal government advised citizens of the United States not to go to Germany or Denmark.

New Virus In South Africa: Worldwide Financial Markets Have Fallen

Europe’s 27 members demanded a travel restriction for EU citizens after reports that South Africa’s most populous province was seeing a widening spread of the variant. There were no flights from South Africa, and five other neighboring countries were allowed to land at Heathrow Airport. According to Oanda’s Jeffrey Halley, until further information is available, investors are likely to take action and wait for answers.

The FTSE 100 in London fell to 7,067.17 points, while the DAX in Frankfurt dropped 3.3 points to 15,391.00 points in the opening hour of trading. It dropped 4% to 6,789.13 points on the CAC 40 market in Paris. The S&P 500 futures contract declined by 1.6 percentage points on Wall Street. On this day, the Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 2% of its value. The Shanghai Composite Index dropped by 0.6 percent to 3,564.09 points in Asia, while the Nikkei 225 index in Tokyo declined by 0.6 percent to 28,751.62. To put it another way, the Hang Seng Index in Hong Kong fell 2.7 percent to 24,080.52.

Seoul’s Kospi index sank 1.5% to 2,936.44 points, while Sydney’s S&P-ASX 200 index fell 1.7% to 7,279.30 points. In India, the Sensex lost 2.2% to 57,499.50 points. There has also been a decline in markets in New Zealand and Southeast Asia. On Wall Street, the Standard & Poor’s 500 indexes of equities rose by 0.2 percent. Due to a federal holiday in the United States, Friday’s trading session will be shorter than Thursday’s.

Since investors learned that Federal Reserve policymakers were expecting to raise interest rates sooner than initially planned in response to higher inflation in the minutes of their October meeting, which were released this week, they have been more cautious. Investors fear that central bankers may be compelled to withdraw stimulus sooner than planned because of higher-than-expected inflation. According to the Federal Reserve, rates will continue low until the end of 2017.

This is due to solid business earnings in the United States and signs of a recovery in global economic activity after last year’s record drop in activity due to the outbreak. The Federal Reserve and other central banks’ policies of low-interest rates and other stimulus have raised stock values. According to the Energy Information Administration, the price of a barrel of New York Mercantile Exchange benchmark U.S. crude fell by $4.52 to $73.87. The cost of Brent crude, which acts as a benchmark for worldwide oil prices, slid $3.65 per barrel to $77.27 in London. On Friday, the dollar fell to 114.39 yen, down from Thursday’s close of 115.36 yen. From $1.1223 to $1.1221 in value, the euro climbed.


Nikki Attkisson

With over 15 years as a practicing journalist, Nikki Attkisson found herself at Powdersville Post now after working at several other publications. She is an award-winning journalist with an entrepreneurial spirit and worked as a journalist covering technology, innovation, environmental issues, politics, health etc. Nikki Attkisson has also worked on product development, content strategy, and editorial management for numerous media companies. She began her career at local news stations and worked as a reporter in national newspapers.

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