Oil Companies Stock Down as Dow Jones Plummets 1,800 Points, Biotech Stocks Also Bleeding

UTC by Tolu Ajiboye · 3 min read
Oil Companies Stock Down as Dow Jones Plummets 1,800 Points, Biotech Stocks Also Bleeding
Photo: Pixabay

Dow Jones has lost over 1,880 points due to a row of factors including Saudi’s oil price slash as well as the coronavirus that is quickly spreading. More bleeding is expected.

All over the world, markets have been feeling terrible effects of the coronavirus COVID-19 outbreak. In recent times, the epidemic has caused stocks to plunge considerably, with a lot of companies seriously bleeding. Projections for the coronavirus have been quite pessimistic with forecasts that things will get worse. While everyone is still significantly confused, the oil market has added to the terrible effects of the coronavirus, so much that the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DIJA) has shed considerable weight.

Dow Jones Crashes

The U.S. stock market temporarily suspended trading today for 15 minutes, after the Dow Jones bled shockingly. The DIJA crashed by 7%, losing 1,884 points shortly after the opening bell. At the moment, there is considerable and somewhat understandable panic at the state of things in the stock market.

There are two major reasons for the recent plunge. Firstly, the coronavirus is worsening, with the number of confirmed cases and also the death toll, on a steady rise. There are now more than 110,000 confirmed cases with the number of deaths slowly nearing 4,000.

The second reason, the more likely cause of the recent crash, is the plunge in oil prices. In a surprising turn of events, Saudi Arabia cut oil prices by 30%, basically declaring an oil war. This is a fall out of the situation between OPEC and Russia as the latter refused to cut down on its output.

Dow Jones Massive Sell-Off Imminent

At the moment, investors are quite confused. The turn of events in 2020 so far has been far from pleasurable for these traders and the companies as well. The circuit breaker that kicked in and caused the temporary halt in trading, might even cause more harm than good. While it is a safety measure, it almost always signifies that there is severe and undesirable uncertainty.

November 8th, 2016, was the last time this happened, which was President Donald Trump’s win. In that case, the market traded higher as investors swooped. This case is however very different because of all the uncertainty that had set in, even before the oil price crash. Analysts now predict that the Dow Jones as well as other indexes might experience heavy sell-off.

Other Plunges

Many oil companies might lose more weight. Firms like Exxon Mobil Corporation (NYSE: XOM), Chevron Corporation(NYSE: CVX) and even Schlumberger Limited (NYSE: SLB) are already plunging. So far, the three have already lost 7.7%, 10.5%, and 29% respectively.

Additionally, the Hang Seng Index in Hong Kong has lost 4.2%, with the U.K’s FTSE 100 Index and Japan’s Nikkei 225 Index crashing 6.7% and 5.1% respectively.

The S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite both lost 7% each.

Biotech Stocks

For a while now, biotech stocks have enjoyed reasonable health while others have plunged. This is because a lot of them are working on treatments and vaccines for the coronavirus. However, even those are currently trading in red.

For example, Gilead Sciences Inc (GILD) lost nearly 6%, Novavax Inc (NASDAQ: NVAX) has dropped over 4% and Regeneron Pharmaceuticals Inc (NASDAQ: RGN) has crashed 4.33%. Other losses include Vir Biotechnology Inc’s (NASDAQ: VIR) at 14.35%, and Sanofi S.A. (EPA: SAN) at 3.55%

Even Inovio Pharmaceuticals Inc (NASDAQ: INO) has lost its momentum and is down 9.16%. It is trading at $12.80.

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