Coronavirus Updates: Infections has now topped 16 million, US headed towards fiscal cliff

In the latest updates, the number of coronavirus infections has now topped 16 million, according to the tally by Johns Hopkins University.

Meanwhile, the financial market's eyes are firmly on the US.

Since the COVID-19 outbreak was first diagnosed, it has spread to over 200 countries and all US states.

Florida has overtaken New York in the number of coronavirus cases, according to the latest figures from the state's health department on Sunday.

The Sunshine State has reported 423,855 total cases, up 12,180 in the last 24 hours. New York, once the epicentre of the US outbreak has 411,200 total, seeing just hundreds of daily new infections.

California, with a population of nearly 40 million, about twice Florida's, is now the worst-hit state, nearing 450,000 cases.

The pandemic is negatively affecting global economic growth beyond anything experienced in nearly a century and the V-shaped recovery thesis is very quickly being torn up and thrown in the bin.

Estimates has indicated that the virus would trim global economic growth by just 3.0% to 6.0% in 2020, with a partial recovery in 2021, assuming there is not a second wave of infections.

However, we are seeing nations having to resort to secondary shutdowns, such as Spain for which more countries are cautioning citizens from travelling to the country. 

Virus clusters in Spain's northeast regions of Catalonia and Aragon have prompted authorities to impose restrictions in Barcelona, in a rural area around Lleida and in Zaragoza. 

Key updates (Aljazeera):

• Florida has overtaken New York in the number of coronavirus cases, according to the latest figures from the state's health department.
• Vietnam is again on high alert for the coronavirus after medical officials detected the country's first few locally transmitted cases in three months. 
• Australia recorded its highest ever daily tally of deaths from the novel coronavirus, all in Victoria as authorities in the state battled scores of clusters of infection.
• India's Prime Minister Narendra Modi says the public should remain extremely vigilant as the country nears a total of 1,400,000 infections, with almost 50,000 cases reported in the past 24 hours.
• The number of coronavirus infections has hit 16 million worldwide, while more than 646,800 people have died, according to a tally by Johns Hopkins University. More than 9.3 million patients have recovered.

Global equities buoyed by Vaccine hopes

Meanwhile, Global stocks markets hit fresh 5-month highs last week on increasing optimism that human trials for both Gilead’s Remdesivir COVID treatment and AstraZeneca/ Oxford Uni vaccine are showing very promising results.

However, the very sharp deterioration in relations between the US and China dragged on sentiment as the week wore on.

We have geopolitics flaring-up, and as analysts at Westpac explained,

the US economy is hurtling towards ‘fiscal cliff’ which will mean amongst many other things that the last of the Pandemic Unemployment Insurance $600 cheques will be mailed to millions of former employees who have lost their jobs through no fault of their own this weekend.

Market implications

Analysts at Westpac explained, 

During periods of heightened geopolitical tension, the US$ often acts as something of a ‘safe haven’ There were no signs of that being the case this last week. Indeed, the US$ hit 2yr lows, as signs that the improvement in the labour market has started to stall with the virus ravaging states in the south and west and reopenings being wound back.