Asian Market Broadly Lower, Nikkey fall over 4%

The Asian and Pacific Rim markets were broadly lower in the morning at the start of trade on Monday. Traders are still worrying about the economic impact regarding the global economic impact from the Covid-19 pandemic. The Covid-19 is also known as the coronavirus.

The United States, according President Donald Trump will extend social distancing guidelines until April 30.

In Japan, the Asian benchmark, the Nikkei 225 was down over four percent after the opening bell. Traders are still trying to get a handle on the overall economic damage from the Covid-19 virus as it shutters entire countries bring business and economic activity to a standstill throughout the region and world.

In Tokyo, the broader Topix index was down 4.59 percent. Shares of Softbank Group tanked over eight percent early on.

In South Korea, the Kospi composite index was down 3.06 percent.

Elsewhere in the Asian and Pacific Rim, the Australian S&P ASX 200 bucked the overall trend to add 1.28 percent. The ASX shed over five percent on Friday.

Asian Traders continue to monitor the Covid-19 Pandemic

There are now nearly 720,000 cases of the coronavirus (Covid-19) worldwide and the number of those infected in the United States is rising exponentially.

Italy has now over 10,000 dead and other countries, including South Africa are reporting new cases.

So far the Covid-19 virus has claimed at least 33,925 lives at the time of this report. This is according to data released by John Hopkins University.

The global financial markets continue with the volatility as a number of central banks are enacting large monetary stimulus programs to support and insulate their economies as activity grinds to a halt.

The Federal Reserve Board is buying an unlimited amount of Treasuries and mortgage backed securities, quantitative easing. The Fed is also buying corporate debt as well as ETFs back by corporate bonds.

A number of countries, including the United States, have introduced massive economic stimulus programs to help businesses and households.