Stocks in Canada’s largest centre joined their worldwide brethren in losing copiously on Wednesday, as fears of a bigger outbreak of the coronavirus raised their collective head.
The S&P/TSX Composite Index headed lower 270.37 points, or 1.7%, to end Wednesday at 15,294.38.
The Canadian dollar sagged 0.40 cents to 73.38 cents U.S.
Energy stocks were the worst bruised of all the subgroups, with Vermilion Energy trailing 53 cents, or 7.8%, to $6.40, while Seven Generations Energy flopped 25 cents, or 7.1%, to $3.26.
Health-care issues also took a pasting as HEXO fell five cents, or 4.7%, to $1.01, while Bausch Health Companies sank $1.16, or 4.4%, to $25.35.
Among financials, Equitable Group docked $2.88, or 3.9%, to $70.22, while ECN Financial fell 16 cents, or 3.8%, to $4.04.
Consumer staples proved the only holdout against the negative tide, with Empire Company soaring 48 cents, or 1.5%, to $32.26, while Alimentation Couche-Tard advanced 64 cents, to 1.5%, to $42.42.
ON BAYSTREET
The TSX Venture Exchange trailed 2.05 points to 584.79.
All but one of the 12 subgroups were still negative by the closing bell, with energy fading 3.8%, health-care, fell 2.5%, and financials, off 1.9%.
Only consumer staples prospered, and only 0.6% at that.
ON WALLSTREET
Stocks fell sharply on Wednesday as traders grew worried about the increasing number of newly confirmed coronavirus cases, which raised concern about the economic reopening and recovery.
The Dow Jones Industrials dumped 710.16 points, or 2.7%, to close a dreadful trading day at 25,445.94. At one point, the Dow had fallen more than 800 points on Wednesday.
The S&P 500 sank 80.96 points, or 2.6%, to 3,050.33.
The NASDAQ Composite dumped 222.20 points, or 2.2%, to 9,909.17.
The tech-heavy NASDAQ sustained its first daily decline in nine sessions.
It was the worst day for all three indexes since June 11.
Shares of companies primed to benefit from the economy reopening faltered. United Airlines fell 8.3%. Delta, American and Southwest all slid over 7%. Airlines were especially hit by the quarantine orders issued by New York, New Jersey and Connecticut.
Carnival faded 11.1%, Norwegian Cruise Line declined 12.4% and Royal Caribbean was lower by 11.3%, respectively. Retailer Gap also fell 7.8%. Disney, meanwhile, declined by 3.9% after its Orlando theme-park workers petitioned to postpone the reopening amid the spike in cases in Florida.
The major averages hit their lows of the day after Florida said its confirmed cases jumped by 5,508 on Tuesday, a record, and now total 109,014. The state also said its positivity rate rose to 15.91% from 10.82%.
Analysis of Johns Hopkins University data found the U.S. seven-day average of coronavirus cases surged more than 30% from a week ago after the total number of cases grew by more than 31,000 on Monday.
California is one of the states which have seen a dramatic spike in cases, adding more than 6,000 on Monday alone. In Texas, the COVID-19 hospitalization rate has hit a record for 12 straight days.
Prices for the 10-Year Treasury gained ground, weighing yields down to 0.68% from Tuesday’s 0.71%. Treasury prices and yields move in opposite directions.
Oil prices slumped $2.30 to $38.07 U.S. a barrel.
Gold prices subsided $1.60 to $1,780.40 U.S. an ounce.