The world is approaching 2 million cases of the novel coronavirus. As the disease continues spreading, mostly in the United States and Europe at present, it is expected that the number of cases will go over 2 million by tomorrow. The US alone has almost 600,000 patients with Covid-19. In Europe, Spain is the hardest hit country with around 170,000 cases.
Despite the high number of cases of Covid-19 in Italy and Spain, the two countries are reportedly preparing to relax the lockdown and reopen their economies. The first steps both countries will take will be to allow some businesses that were closed during the worst of the pandemic to open again. The rest of Europe plans to remain under strict quarantine rules well into May.
Donald Trump also wants to reopen the US economy, having previously expressed a desire to do so for Easter (which was last weekend in the United States), which he didn’t fulfill. Nevertheless, experts are warning that the States has still not seen the peak of the pandemic and encouraging more public activity by reopening the economy could be dangerous and irresponsible.
In other news, the oil market still remains volatile. Despite a new deal by OPEC+ to curb production, prices have not rallied, and are in fact moving downward again. The reason for this is that the market remains oversupplied, because demand is extremely low amid the pandemic.
