Yahoo Finance Breaking: Oil Facing Worst Weekly Crash Since '08 Financial Crisis
By Barani Krishnan
Investing.com - Crude prices are on track to plunge 17% on the week as the investor stampede from oil due to the coronavirus crisis results in the market’s worst bloodbath since the financial crisis.
* West Texas Intermediate, the U.S. crude benchmark, fell $2.82, or 6%, at $44.27 per barrel, the lowest since December 2018. On a weekly basis, WTI is down 17%, heading for its biggest weekly plunge since the financial crisis week of Dec. 14, 2008.
* Brent, the London-traded global benchmark for crude, was down $2.53, or 4.9%, at $49.20 per barrel, breaking the key $50 support. The $49.20 level was also Brent’s lowest on the day and a bottom going back to July 2017. For the week, Brent is down 15.8%.
* Oil plunged as stocks on Wall Street succumbed to a freefall. The S&P 500 was down 3% on the day and about 14% on the week, the worst weekly slump since October 2008.
* The World Health Organization (WHO) on Friday said that it had raised its risk assessment relating to COVID-19 for the rest of the world to very high from high. China, where the outbreak of the novel coronavirus started, had previously been designated with a very-high risk assessment.
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