A market analysis by some analyst about how the markets will react on this Monday etc: https://www.marketwatch.com/story/h...monday-analysts-say-11638021516?siteid=yhoof2 " Here’s what the Black Friday carnage may mean for the stock market’s trade Monday, analysts say Last Updated: Nov. 28, 2021 at 5:36 p.m. ET First Published: Nov. 27, 2021 at 8:58 a.m. ET By Mark DeCambre OMG, omicron! The new, fast-spreading B.1.1.529 strain of coronavirus declared a variant of concern by the World Health Organization roiled global markets on Black Friday, raising concerns about how the economy and Wall Street may perform in the coming week, following a selloff that wiped out November gains for the S&P 500 index SPX, -2.27% and the Nasdaq Composite COMP, -2.23% and sent the Dow Jones Industrial Average DJIA, -2.53% down by the most in a day since Oct. 28, 2020. WHO said that the omicron variant, which has been detected in Belgium, Israel, and Hong Kong and was first identified in southern parts of Africa, is more transmissible than the delta strain that is currently dominant world-wide, and other variants. The emergence of the new strain led to the White House announcing restrictions, starting on Monday, on travel for non-U.S. citizens and residents from South Africa, as well as from Botswana, Zimbabwe, Namibia, Lesotho, Eswatini, Mozambique, and Malawi, joining the European Union, the U.K., Singapore and Japan, which also announced similar travel bans. The market selloff during the abbreviated Black Friday session and the commensurate flight to assets that investors hope will perform better amid fresh mobility restrictions, helped to overshadow the usual focus on retail, on a day associated with heavy consumer spending ahead of the Christmas holiday. Friday’s downturn also offered a crystal clear reminder that the path of the market and economy hinges on the course of COVID. ... <... ctd at above link ...> "
For me, the extraordinary moves seen on Friday mean one clear thing - there is about a 50% chance of early follow-through and late recovery, and a 50% chance of early recovery and late follow-through. I don't play games with a 50:50 chance of winning.
But it definitely is not a 50:50 chance with some industries like the airlines as well sealines, ie. esp. stocks of tourism companies etc... And of course the stocks of vaccine companies have already and will even rise more... And also oil and crypto fell strong on Friday. And not to forget the very companies that are specialized on Black Friday sales... They are big losers as well...
Maybe. The same was said about the original virus, though. Clearly not a non-issue, although the markets seem to think so. So maybe it is a non-issue.
My investing decisions are governed by what is happening in the market (vs real life). So if the market deems something a non-issue, I trade accordingly. You're right about the original virus. However the endless variants haven't amounted to any real change.
To be fair, the move on last Friday was not black. It was just simply a market pullback 1) reacting to the information of this new potentially more dangerous variant and 2) taking a breather from the ridiculous bull move for the past several months or so.
Especially that it's going to take several weeks for them to find out if the vaccines are effective or not. I would imagine the vaccine's effectiveness news would be a bigger market mover.
And we are hearing different views from prominent doctors about the new omicron variant: One from the South African doctor who discovered this omicron variant describing the symptoms of covid-19 produced by this variant is "extremely mild" and very different from the previous variant in that it just had a scratchy throat and muscle/joint pain and headache and none of the loss of taste/smell or cough https://www.cnbc.com/2021/11/29/omicron-covid-variant-symptoms-heres-what-we-know-so-far.html And then there is Dr. Anthony Fauci who stated that USA should be prepared to do anything and everything possible to fight the omicron variant. https://www.cnbc.com/2021/11/28/fau...-to-do-anything-to-fight-omicron-variant.html And meanwhile it's going to take weeks to confirm if the vaccines that exist so far are effective against the new variant or not. So I imagine there is going to be lots of indecisions in the market but coupled with volatile moves because the market is extremely on edge and jittery and can react to anything with violent moves which may give away to nothing at the end of the day thus producing not large ranges but with huge potentially large intra-day moves.