Safe-haven assets rise amid coronavirus concerns

Safe-haven assets rise amid coronavirus concerns

Gold prices rose while the USD/EUR currency pair reached a four month high on Monday as investors retreated to safe-haven assets amid China’s rising death toll from the coronavirus outbreak.

Weak economic data in the Eurozone made the Greenback relatively more attractive to traders than the single currency. This has been made especially so, considering Friday’s U.S. non-farm payrolls report showing an accelerated job growth in January.  

Meanwhile the Eurozone’s data on Monday showed Italian industrial output recorded much lower than expected in December. A later report on Friday showed German industrial output suffering its biggest fall since its 2009 recession.

Investors continued to keep an eye on the status of the virus which had killed more than 900 people as of Sunday. While the full economic impact of the virus is still unknown, many are expecting it to worsen the slowdown in the Chinese economy.