Financial safety

The Stock Market Is Tanking. Do Nothing.

Wash your hands. Ignore the markets. Don’t touch your face. And don’t touch your stocks.

That is hard advice to follow. With the coronavirus epidemic intensifying, the markets have entered a period of extraordinary volatility. Don’t act on the information that follows: Over the weekend, the price of oil cratered 25 percent. Stock-market futures plunged so dramatically that the exchanges shut down, as did equity exchanges this morning. The entire United States Treasury yield curve fell below 1 percent for the first time ever; in layman’s terms, that means investors were paying for the privilege of lending money to the American government, due to overwhelming demand for safe assets. A fear gauge of the bond market hit its highest level since the 2008 financial crisis, maybe its highest level ever. Panic, chaos, terror, and uncertainty reigned.