The impact of the ongoing coronavirus pandemic on the stock market is on track to be worse than the 2008 financial crisis with the FTSE 100 being 29.32% down since January 27.

Stock markets across North America, Europe and Asia have also been heavily affected by the recent panic surrounding the outbreak.

The S&P500 has opened today’s trading session at 2,552 after closing yesterday at 2,741, marking a further 7.28% decline.

Continued panic will trigger circuit breakers in the US markets, an event that happened earlier this week. These are events that have occurred extremely rarely over the past decade.

The financial crisis in 2008 caused a 49.45% crash in the FTSE100 as it plunged from 6,739 to 3,439 within a matter of months.

However, the speed of the recent decline trumps that of 2008, which suggests that continuation to the downside will undoubtedly cause a larger and potentially longer-lasting impact on the stock market.

Economic stimulus and interest rate cuts have been put into motion by numerous countries across the world although it has failed to have the desired effect.

Alternative markets have also been hit hard during the recent downturn with Bitcoin and Ethereum losing almost 50% of their respective value since early February.

One asset that has performed relatively well considering the panic has been gold, which is up by 3% since the turn of the year after surging to a seven-year high of $1,700 per ounce.

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