Today the total number of coronavirus cases worldwide sits just under 19 million (at 18.99 million, to be precise). The United States is approaching 5 million infections, Brazil is nearing 3 million, and India is about to hit 2 million cases. The daily rate of infection remains above 50,000 in these three countries.
In Europe, Spain, Germany, and France are beginning to see a resurgence of Covid-19. Spain had more than 2,000 new cases yesterday and 5,000 the day before. France and Germany both had over 1,000 new cases yesterday.
The spikes could relate to the holiday season, with people from northern European countries traveling to the generally more affected south and returning sick. The numbers are not alarming yet, but it is worth keeping an eye on the situation in Europe.
Speaking of the coronavirus, Donald Trump got in hot water over it again. Both the President’s own Twitter account and the account of his re-election campaign were flagged by the social network for tweeting an interview where Trump makes false statements about the virus.
Facebook, which was previously criticized for not doing enough to limit misinformation and fake news, also removed a post with the same interview from Trump’s page.
In the meantime, lawmakers in the United States are still trying to negotiate a new stimulus bill and meeting with tons of difficulties. Investors are going to take this in account together with today’s jobless claims reports.
In terms of the stock markets, today indices are still undecided. We expect earnings reports from Uber and T-Mobile (the US division).
There was also a Bank of England policy meeting today. However, it did not yield any interesting results, as the central bank left the interest rate unchanged at 0.1% and did not increase its asset purchasing program to offer extra stimulus to the UK economy. This news was positive for the British pound, offering a boost against the euro.
