This coronavirus share market crash is unlike those that have gone before it
- Written by Kylie-Anne Richards, Lecturer, Finance Discipline, University of Technology Sydney
Stock markets have crashed, we can be confident of that. History suggests there is no quick recovery from crashes like these, which means lasting consequences for investors.
The World Health Organisation declared the COVID-19 coronavirus a pandemic last Wednesday, wiping US$7 trillion off global equity markets. A day later, now marked down in history as Black Thursday, the Dow Jones index in the US closed down 2,353 points (-10%), the worst single day points decline since Black Monday in 1987.
Staggeringly, the index rebounded sharply the following day. Friday saw the US market closing the roller coaster week up 9.3%.
Shares in the Australian S&P 200 index did the same sort of thing.
Prices collapsed 8% after opening Friday, then rebounded throughout the day to end up about where they started, before collapsing 9.5% on Monday.
Not even normal for a crash
The volatility, velocity and magnitude of these swings is not in the playbook of past global market crises.
Generally, markets have been overvalued, with stocks climbing sharply in recent years despite tepid economic growth in the US and elsewhere and heightened economic and political uncertainty.
If we look at Nobel Prize winner Robert Shiller’s cyclically-adjusted price-to-earnings (CAPE) ratio, a standard equity valuation metric, there have been only two other times in modern history when the US stock market has been more overvalued than today.
They were in 1929 and 2000; ahead of the Great Depression and, more recently the 2000 “Tech Wreck”.
Shiller total return cyclically-adjusted price-earnings ratio
What has been so interesting about the bubble that preceded the coronavirus crash is that there was no identifiable underlying economic or social process driving the market to such dizzying heights.
But there was ultra-easy monetary policy (including unconventional policies).
The problem we have now is that with rates so close to zero (or even negative in some countries), central banks are powerless to tame the turmoil by conventionally cutting interest rates.
Read more: Below zero is ‘reverse’. How the Reserve Bank would make quantitative easing work
It is making investors worried about governments’ abilities to respond in time to contain or reduce the severity of human and economic devastation.
We are dealing with a global health crisis the likes of which has not been seen for 100 years. It will keep investor sentiment fragile and prone to sudden shifts.
If the last two weeks is anything to go by, the resulting volatility will test the normal functioning of markets.
Faster and more jumpy
There is no formal definition of a market crash, but what we see here has all the hallmarks:
• a 20% decline in equity markets, which defines a bear market, has been achieved in two weeks.
• rates of transacting (velocity) across global markets has been high and a good deal higher than in previous crises. Electronic systems provide a catalyst to embed the panic (uncertainly) into the pricing. We’ve seen huge swings in prices, at increased transaction rates.
In the US, market circuit breakers have been triggered in both falling and rising markets. Black Thursday saw a 15-minute trading hold at the opening to prevent a free fall of stock prices. A day later the New York Stock Exchange’s “limit-up” brake was triggered.
Read more: How will coronavirus affect property prices?
Transaction costs have been inflated with the “spread” between buying and selling prices widening significantly compared with pre-crisis levels, and almost twice what it was during the GFC.
Intraday volatility (the swing from high to low within one day) is approaching what was observed during the global financial crisis.
US S&P500 Index intraday change from high to low
Authors: Kylie-Anne Richards, Lecturer, Finance Discipline, University of Technology Sydney