Resilience of the Labour Markets during COVID-19 vanguardngr.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from vanguardngr.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Three months into 2020, coronavirus fears took hold of global markets and fixed-income researchers watched as credit markets collapsed at a record pace.
“There was enormous dislocation and disruption from the first or second week of March until sometime in April and this happened in virtually every market, including the most liquid as well as corporate credit and high yield,” said Vishwanath Tirupattur, global director of fixed income research at Morgan Stanley. “Liquidity dried up quite dramatically in a very short period of time.”
At the peak of market uncertainty, credit spreads had drastically widened, with U.S. high-grade credit spreads reaching above 250 basis points, and lower-rated sectors widening much further, according to Matthew Jozoff, co-head of fixed income, currencies, and commodities research at JPMorgan Chase & Co.
U.S. Markets Hit Record Highs on Stimulus Hopes
Technology stocks climbed Monday, extending a 2020 rally that’s fueled much of the market’s gains since March. The Nasdaq was up 62 points, while the Dow lost 185 and the S&P dropped 16. As of Monday, the Nasdaq was up nearly 40 per cent for the year, while the S&P and Dow had added 13 per cent and 4.6 per cent, respectively.
While markets climbed early on growing hopes for a new U.S. stimulus deal, optimism faded later in the session as investors weighed the potential for further lockdowns in the U.S. In Canada, the TSX lost 161 points, weighed down by the energy, financials and materials sectors.
It was a rough session for N.A. markets Wednesday, with the TSX off nearly 80 points as the materials and tech sector weighed on the index. In the U.S., markets retreated from record highs as negotiations stalled once again between lawmakers looking to pass another fiscal stimulus package.
U.S. markets retreated Thursday morning after fresh data showed new jobless claims jumped sharply last week to 853,000 substantially more than economists had forecast. The latest jobs data underscores the desperate need for more stimulus, but Republicans seem unwilling to sign off on a substantial spending bill. Also weighing on sentiment was the latest coronavirus data from the U.S., with the death toll climbing to a new single-day record of 3,100. By Thursday’s close, the numbers were mixed: the Dow was down 75 points, the Nasdaq was up 67, and the TSX added 33.