Dow risks longest Friday losing streak in 14 years as coronavirus has Wall Street dreading weekends

TGIF? That is hardly the case for Wall Street investors who own stocks in the Dow Jones Industrial Average, which is on track on Friday for a dubious distinction if it finishes in negative territory.

Friday sessions have been marked by dread among investors lately because of the uncertain landscape that the coronavirus outbreak has created heading into weekends.

In fact, if the 124-year-old blue-chip index US:DJIA closes lower Friday, it will have put together its longest run of Friday losses, seven straight, since the string of eight straight Friday losses that ended July 2006, according to Dow Jones Market Data.

“Fridays have become the scariest day of the week because we know with a high percentage of certainty that there’s going to be more bad news, and we have seen how that manifests in equity valuations,” Art Hogan, chief market strategist at National Securities, told MarketWatch.

The viral outbreak that was first identified in Wuhan, China, in December has sickened nearly 98,000 people and claimed at least 3,300 lives so far, spreading around the globe.

A series of travel restrictions put in place by various governments as well as policies from large employers recommending that workers reconsider business and even personal trips in some instances is negatively impacting the travel industry and is likely to dent the global, if not the domestic, economy.