BRUSSELS/FRANKFURT/PARIS (dpa-AFX) - French stocks were sharply lower on Thursday as Spain's coronavirus death toll overtook that of China, prompting lawmakers to extend the state of emergency until April 12.
Italy's death toll from the virus crossed the 7,500 mark and New York turned out to be the epicenter of the U.S. outbreak with over 30,000 cases, raising concerns about a global recession.
Worldwide, there are more than 472,000 diagnosed cases of COVID-19, spanning every continent except Antarctica.
The benchmark CAC 40 was down 85 points, or 1.92 percent, at 4,347 after climbing as much as 4.5 percent on Wednesday.
On a light day on the economic front, survey data from market research group GfK showed that a measure of German consumer confidence is set to decline sharply to the lowest in more than a decade in April.
The forward-looking consumer confidence index fell to 2.7 from 8.3 in March as the increase in the number of coronavirus infection cases and the accompanying measures made consumers to take cautious approach.
During the financial and economic crisis, the consumer climate index was at 2.6 points.
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