Stocks Slide On Texas Governor Virus Spread Remarks

Having erased all of Friday’s virus-fear losses, headlines from Texas, with the Governor Greg Abbott warning that the virus was spreading at an unacceptable rate sparked some weakness…

“To state the obvious, COVID-19 is now spreading at an unacceptable rate in Texas,” Abbott says.

“The positivity rate has gone from about 4.5% in late May to almost 9% today.”

“Our goal is to keep Texans out of hospitals and to reduce the number of Texans who test positive…COVID hasn’t simply gone away. We don’t have to choose between jobs and health. We can have both.”

The Miami mayor also poured cold water on reopening hopes:

“This is a real spike,” Miami Beach Mayor Dan Gelber said at the news conference. “Nobody can argue with the fact that more people are being hospitalized.

He added that “it would not be responsible to rely on irrational optimism that all of this is going to go away.”

The timing from a technical perspective was perfect…

Small Caps are hardest hit so far…

But the market remains well bid on the day.