Published on 3 Dec 2021 on Zacks via Yahoo Finance
The mood in Wall Street has remained chiefly tense this week as well. The Dow Jones Industrial Average is down 0.7% this week. The other two broad market indices, the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq Composite, have declined about 0.4% and 0.7%, respectively, in the same period.
The omicron strain has entered the United States, with the second case getting reported by a Minnesota resident. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s confirmation of the first case of omicron in California had already led to a new wave of worries on Dec 1. The new variant is feared to be carrying the combined features of the previous variants and can have high transmissibility and lower vaccine potency.
Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell has also adversely impacted market sentiments by mentioning that the central bank will be discussing speeding up the tapering process from the $15 billion-a-month schedule decided previously, per a CNBC article. This move might be taken to control the persistently high inflation levels, given that the U.S. economy is strongly recovering from the pandemic-led slump.