New York Stock Exchange operators (GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA / AFP / SPENCER PLATT)
The New York Stock Exchange opened sharply lower on Monday, showing gloom after a major setback for Joe Biden in Congress and the announcement of new restrictions due to the Omicron variant of the coronavirus.
Around 3.10 p.m., the Dow Jones fell 1.72% to 34,756.07 points, the Nasdaq index, with a strong technological composition, yielded 1.52% to 14,938.47 points and the extended S&P 500 index, 1.58 % at 4,547.67 points.
Over the weekend, the market, “which was already weak, received two consecutive hits,” said Adam Sarhan, founder and CEO of 50 Park Investments.
The first came from new restrictions announced to deal with the meteoric spread of the Omicron variant to all corners of the world.
The Netherlands notably decreed the closure of all non-essential businesses until January 14, while the Israeli government on Sunday banned its citizens from visiting several European countries.
To this degradation was added the setback of US President Joe Biden, whose massive plan of 1.750 billion dollars seems almost doomed after the refusal of Democratic Senator Joe Manchin to vote for it.
The voice of this moderate elected representative of West Virginia is necessary to pass the text to the Senate, which has exactly as many elected Democrats as Republicans (50).
For Patrick O’Hare, of Briefing.com, the mood of the market is also affected by the prospect of a rate hike by the American Central Bank (Fed) in the spring.
“The conjunction of these factors is fueling fears of a global economic slowdown and companies unable to meet growth expectations” from investors, he added in a note.
In this context, the trend is for less exposure to assets considered at risk or high growth, including the electric vehicle manufacturer Rivian (-3.74%) or the semiconductor specialist Intel (-2.21%) .
The contrast is marked with the tradition of a market which often ends the year on an upward acceleration. “It’s not over,” tempers Patrick O’Hare, “it could still happen, but for now, the general mood has deteriorated.”
The market has crossed several technical thresholds on the downside in recent days “and it could experience a nice rebound,” says Adam Sarhan. “I wouldn’t be surprised if we saw a wave of speculative buybacks this week.”
Among the values noted Monday, Novavax did not take advantage (-1.58% to 213.89 dollars) of the green light, Monday, from the European Medicines Agency (EMA) to the marketing of its anti-Covid vaccine . Nuvaxovid is based on a more traditional technology, similar to that used for vaccines against hepatitis B or pertussis.
The competitor of Novavax, Moderna, capitalized him (+ 1.13% to 298.14 dollars) on the results of a clinical study which shows that a booster of its anti-Covid vaccine made with a full dose, against a half -dose currently, further increases its effectiveness against the Omicron variant of the coronavirus.
The American software publisher and remote computing giant (cloud), Oracle, slipped (-2.94% to 93.78 dollars) after the announcement of the acquisition of Cerner (+ 0.84% to $ 90.52), a company specializing in IT services to the medical sector, with an enterprise value of $ 28.3 billion.
The chain of cinemas AMC managed to extricate itself from the doldrums (+ 1.89% to 29.67 dollars) after the announcement that the film “Spider-Man: No Way Home” had grossed 253 million dollars at the box -North American office this weekend, the third best outing of all time, pandemic or not.
A sign of investor risk aversion, US bond yields eased again. The average rate for 10-year US government bonds stood at 1.39%, against 1.40% on Friday.
The Italian fashion house Ermenegildo Zegna made an encouraging debut on Wall Street (+ 3.47% to 10.14 dollars), where it entered through a financial vehicle of the European group Investindustrial, thus becoming the first Italian label to be listed in New York.
© 2021 AFP
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