Coming into February, a lot has changed from the first week of the New Year. The parabolic move in the market, where stocks rallied every single day, sometimes on no new news, has given way to a wave of fresh worries and unknowns. I will go through all of these in this Special report. 

Coronavirus

Most Wall Street pros see this as a short-lived event, perhaps lasting up to three months; maybe even shorter if outbreaks are limited outside and curbed inside China. However, the fear factor grows as the infection count grows. It is something to consider that a virus at a food market in China could shake up the world in a short time.

I’m fascinated by this story. I can’t wait to learn more about how it evolved and spread so quickly, although it’s unlikely we’ll ever get the whole story. Articles from the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) and The Lancet Journal help piece together a visual picture of the Wuhan Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market, a so-called ‘wet market,’ where a wide variety of seafood is sold by individual vendors.

In addition to seafood, there are reports of live animals being sold for human consumption that include wild boars, raccoons, dogs, bats (not sold at Wuhan), cobras, Himalayan Palm civets, and chickens.

The NEJM looked at the characteristics of the first 47 patients with the coronavirus and found that 26 had exposure from the Wuhan Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market and 4 had exposure to other wet markets. Those percentages declined as the virus spread.

Click here to read the full report.