Coronavirus fears, oil price plunge pummel world stocks

Coronavirus fears, oil price plunge pummel world stocks

NEW YORK/LONDON (Reuters) - Global stock markets plunged on Monday and oil prices tumbled by as much as a third after Saudi Arabia launched a price war with Russia, sending investors already spooked by the coronavirus outbreak fleeing for the safety of bonds and the Japanese yen.. A benchmark pan-Europe index entered bear market territory and a 7% slide in the S&P 500 at the open on Wall Street triggered a circuit-breaker put in place after the financial crisis a decade ago, halting U.S. stock trading for 15 minutes.. "The oil price plunge adds a huge disruptive dynamic to markets that are already very fragile," said Paul O'Connor, multi-asset head at Janus Henderson in London.. Saudi Arabia's grab for market share was reminiscent of a drive in 2014 that sent prices down by about two-thirds, while the renewed plunge on Wall Street came exactly 11 years after U.S. stocks touched bottom during the financial crisis.. The Dow fell a record 2,000 points when trading opened and the S&P 500 was poised for its largest single-day percentage drop since December 2008, the depths of the financial crisis.. The benchmark index was almost 19% below its all-time high of Feb 19 -