Oil prices and Asian stocks collapse under coronavirus fears March 9, 2020 Oil prices and stocks collapsed today as investors piled into safe havens in a bid to escape the fallout of a fresh spread of coronavirus. Oil prices plunged around 30 per cent after Saudi Arabia signalled its intention to ramp up production. And investors knocked 30-year US bond yields below one per cent as they [...]
Can interest rate cuts help economies deal with coronavirus? March 8, 2020 Last Tuesday, the coronavirus outbreak drove the US Federal Reserve to do something it hadn’t done since the 2008 financial crisis: slash interest rates in an emergency move. Fed chair Jay Powell said rate-setters had “come to the view that it is time for us to act in the support of the economy”. The economic [...]
US posts strong jobs data but analysts say coronavirus means report ‘outdated before it came out’ March 6, 2020 The US posted strong jobs data for February today but markets remained in the red on fears of the impact of coronavirus on the world economy. Total nonfarm payroll employment rose by 273,000 in February, and the unemployment rate was little changed at 3.5 per cent, the US Bureau of Labor Statistics said today. The [...]
Government bond yields sink to record low on coronavirus disruption March 6, 2020 Government bond yields sunk to fresh historic lows as fears over the impact of the coronavirus epidemic on global growth sent investors rushing to safe haven assets. Concerns over the outbreak have sent equities tumbling across the globe and pushed the price of several government bonds to historic highs, while yields (which move inversely to [...]
PSSL threatens Pollen Street Capital with legal action to obtain documents March 5, 2020 Pollen Street Secured Lending (PSSL) has hit back at Pollen Street Capital and is threatening legal action to obtain due diligence materials. In a punchy letter to shareholders, PSSL chairman Simon King said that PSC is trying to ensure that Waterfall Asset Management’s bid will not proceed. In January, Waterfall made a possible cash offer [...]
Goldman Sachs and UBS expect Bank of England rate cut March 5, 2020 Investment banking giants Goldman Sachs and UBS are both predicting that the Bank of England will cut interest rates in response to the coronavirus outbreak. Goldman analysts expect the BoE will slash rates by 50 basis points (0.5 per cent) at its meeting next month, saying that the epidemic is likely to push the UK [...]
Coronavirus: the economic impact March 5, 2020 The coronavirus threatens to derail the revival in global economic growth which began in the latter part of 2019. Economic indicators up to January continued to show an improvement in activity with business surveys signalling rising orders and output. However, confidence in the sustainability of the upswing has been undermined by the virus, officially known [...]
UK bond yields hit all-time low on coronavirus fears March 4, 2020 UK government bond yields have fallen to an all-time low after the economic threat of coronavirus led the US Federal Reserve to slash interest rates, a move traders increasingly think the Bank of England will copy. The yield on the 10-year UK Gilt touched 0.335 per cent this morning as investors rushed to buy one [...]
FTSE 100 rises as investors weigh coronavirus stimulus measures March 4, 2020 The FTSE 100 rose for a third consecutive day this morning, as traders in London weighed up the economic impact of coronavirus and digested news of yesterday’s emergency rate cut by the US Federal Reserve. The blue-chip index got off to a jittery start, opening slightly higher before dropping into the red, but then recovered [...]
Coronavirus: Two more cases confirmed in Scotland as UK total hits 53 March 4, 2020 Two more cases of coronavirus have been confirmed in Scotland, the country’s health secretary Jeane Freeman has said, bringing the UK’s total number of cases to 53. Speaking to the BBC’s Good Morning Scotland programme, Freeman said the total number of cases in Scotland was now three. She added that she could not confirm whether [...]