Last night President Donald Trump told Sean Hannity on his Fox News show that his administration is planning to “reopen” the U.S. economy. “We’re looking at the concept where we open sections of the country and we’re also looking at the concept where you open up everything,” President Trump said. One plan under consideration, Bloomberg reports, would begin in smaller cities and towns in states that haven’t yet been heavily hit by the virus. Cities such as New York, Detroit, New Orleans and other “hot spots” would remain shuttered. Not clear what would happen in other “hot spots” such as Florida, California, New Jersey, and Massachusetts. The plan would rely on a massive increase in testing for the coronavirus and a new system for tracing contacts among infected people.
At the same time Anthony Fauci, director of the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said the start of a turnaround in the fight against the virus could come after this week.
The actual data wasn’t quite as positive this morning. The U.K. and Belgium had their deadliest day of the outbreak so far, and Spain reported fatalities and new cases rising to the highest in four days.
In New York 779 more people had died in New York, the highest single-day death toll yet, Governor Andrew Cuomo reported on Wednesday, the second day in a row that the state broke its one-day record death toll. But the hospitalization figures continue to show that the curve of infection is flattening in the state. The number of virus patients in hospitals increased by 3% since Tuesday, in contrast with 25% increases of weeks past. If hospitalization rates continue to fall, the number of deaths will fall too, Governor Cuomo said.
The most worrying news of the day, however, comes from Singapore. Singapore’s Health Ministry confirmed 142 new coronavirus infections on Wednesday, the biggest daily increase yet. This has raised fears that the city state, which looked to have the virus under control, is about to experience a second wave of the disease. A second wave is the biggest worry right now in China. In Singapore 40of the new cases were linked to foreign worker dormitories. The Southeast Asian city state has quarantined workers in three dormitories. Only two of the infections were imported. Contact tracing is pending on the remaining 72.In an effort to prevent a second wave Singapore this week banned public and private gatherings of any size and will fine or jail those involved in meetings among friends or family members who are not living together. The country has closed workplaces, except for essential services and key economic sectors, and schools have moved to full home-based learning.
Today, at least, the market has decided to listen to the positive parts of this mixed message.
As of noon New York time today March 8, the Standard & Poor’s 50 was up 2.06%. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was ahead 2.23%. The NASDAQ had climbed 1.77% and the Russell 2000 small cap index was higher by 3.70%. The iShares MSCI Emerging Markets ETF (EEM) had gained 0.74%.
Now we’ll see if markets can hold their positive trend through the close. Yesterday they couldn’t with markets that had been up all day finishing slightly in the red at the close.
