Forex Today: WHO calls rapidly spreading coronavirus a pandemic, US stocks sink

Here is what you need to know for Thursday 12th March:

US stocks printed in a bearish territory as the World Health Organisation called the rapidly spreading coronavirus a pandemic. Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus acknowledging what has seemed clear for some time — the virus will likely spread to all countries on the globe and said the situation will worsen. “We expect to see the number of cases, the number of deaths, and the number of affected countries climb even higher,” said Tedros, as the director-general is known.

Markets are now looking to the US to speed up the rolling out of testing for the virus. The concerns are that the promised fiscal response is also slow in forthcoming. There is going to be an immense amount of pressure on the Fed to act again on the 18th March. We have also seen a 50 basis point cut from the Bank of England (announced emergency liquidity measures) as well and there are now expectations for a further 50bps cut or more from the Fed. The focus is also the ECB today. 

Markets in focus

• The yield on the US 10-year note traded between 0.65% and 0.89%, +7.19%.
• Oil remained under pressure as crude stocks rise, with WTI falling by 4.5% at the close to a low of $32.60bbls.
• Gold softened a touch but dips are shallow, ending the day -0.89% a $1,634/oz. 
• Wall Street Close: DJIA closes in bear market
• The DAX was down 0.4% and the FTSE 100 was off 1.4%.

FX action

• US Dollar Index Asia Price Forecast: Greenback comes back, bounces from 2020 lows

• EUR/JPY Price Analysis: Euro sideways vs. yen, trades near 117.50 level

• USD/JPY trades deep in negative territory below 105

• EUR/USD traders get set for the ECB

• GBP/USD Price Analysis: Pound on the back foot, bears challenge 1.2900 figure

• AUD/USD stalls recovery near 0.6540 amid risk-off, USD rebound

Looking ahead

Trump is scheduled to address the nation at 2100 Easter Time: US President Trump: If we get rid of the coronavirus problem quickly, we won’t need stimulus