India needs at least 38 million masks to fight coronavirus: agency document

NEW DELHI (Reuters) - India needs at least 38 million masks and 6.2 million pieces of personal protective equipment as it confronts the spread of coronavirus, and has approached hundreds of companies to secure supplies quickly, according to a report by the country’s investment agency seen by Reuters.

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https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-india-equipment/india-needs-at-least-38-million-masks-to-fight-coronavirus-agency-document-idUSKBN21F0HO

Spain Reports Deadliest Day On Record, Trump Invokes Power To Call Up Retired Troops

Yesterday, the US reached a critical milestone: it became the first country to record more than 100,000 cases of COVID-19, the illness caused by the novel coronavirus.

Though more people were almost certainly infected in China - epidemiologists have estimated that hundreds of thousands were likely infected in Wuhan alone - the surge in America's testing capacity, something that's only going to continue to improve thanks to a slate of new rapid-response tests are hitting the market, means the US will almost certainly record the largest number of infected patients going forward.

Already, the global total of confirmed cases surpassed 600,000 overnight, thanks mostly to the US, though Spain and Italy also reported large numbers of new cases and deaths reaffirming that the lockdowns in each of their respective countries are far from over.

A chart produced by the New York Times and published last night sparked a heated debate online as journalists, scientists and other wannabe 'experts' weighed in on the possibility that the outbreaks in New York City, Detroit and New Orleans might be more severe than what Italy has seen in Lombardy.

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https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/spain-reports-deadliest-day-record-japans-abe-promises-unprecedented-stimulus-package

Britain's Housing Market Freezes As Wave Of Delayed Mortgage Payments Looms

One of the more unorthodox measures implemented by No. 10 Downing Street when it placed the entire UK on lockdown earlier this week was a virtual freeze of the country's housing market. For nearly a week now, the housing market across the country has ground to a halt as agents have been prohibited from marketing new homes.

And on Thursday, the government took things a step further, and banned visitors from viewing properties while the "stay-at-home" measures are still in force.

The edict affects all transactions, blocking all transfers of title until further notice, while also banning evictions, it's basically forcing the entire county to stay put in whatever housing situation they have been living in. For those who don't have permanent housing arrangements, it's presumably been a struggle. But that's a relatively small slice of the population.

This is about all prospective homebuyers in the UK can do right now:

"You can speak to estate agents over the phone and they will be able to give you general advice about the local property market and handle certain matters remotely but they will not be able to start actively marketing your home in the usual manner," the government said on Thursday night.

A number of banks and specialist lenders have already withdrawn new mortgages to "focus on existing customers", even as demand for loans is expected to soar. The decision was meant to reduce stress on call centers as most places are expected to be low on staff in the coming weeks.

Lloyds and Barclays have already withdrew most of their mortgage offers, and are expected to cut off all loans currently in the process of being made unless the borrower can put down 40%.

Barclays told brokers it would no longer offer mortgages for customers who did not have a deposit of at least 40%, but it would continue with some remortgaging deals.

With so much uncertainty and such extreme fluctuations in interest rates and credit markets, banks are hoping to put things on pause until things have calmed down a bit.

Bankers told the FT that the withdrawal of mortgage products wasn't a signal that they were running short of financing, as happened in 2008 when funding markets froze.

But with so many borrowers warning lenders to expect delays on their mortgage payments until the federal stimulus checks have been issued, issuing new mortgages right now would almost be stupid. To continue lending money at a time when reliable borrowers are already having trouble doesn't seem to make sense, which is one problem that the government is going to need to solve with this bailout,

https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/britains-housing-market-freezes-wave-delayed-mortgage-payments-looms

"Unprecedented Decline" - The Collapse In World Trade Is A Once In A Generation Shock

COVID-19 is expected to produce a global recession depression as nearly all of the world's major economies have ground to a halt between February and March, expected to continue through April.

The crash in China's economic activity, shown last month, suggests that Europe and the US will face similar outcomes. There is some concern that the longest economic expansion on record will end this quarter as the global economy has been battered by bat soup.

As the fast-spreading virus terrorizes the US, China, Italy, Spain, Germany, France, Iran, the UK, Switzerland, South Korea, and other countries, more than 537,000 confirmed cases had been recorded across the world, with 24,100 deaths.

Governments have had no other choice than to order a complete shutdown of their respected economies to flatten the curve and slowdown infections. As World Trade Organization (WTO) Chief Economist Robert Koopman told Bloomberg, mass quarantines and shuttering of businesses has resulted in a plunge in world trade – "could be seen as a war-like scenario without the physical asset destruction."

Data from the world's busiest ports in China showed containers were piling up with no place to go after supply chain disruptions were seen due to shutdowns in the country. There's also been a significant decline in maritime activity from China to North America, China to the Mediterranean, and China to Europe as the virus crisis worsens in the Western Hemisphere.

In early March, we showed how supply chain disruptions from China started to wash ashore on US West Coast ports, especially collapsing containerized volumes at the Port of Long Beach. IHS Markit data compiled by Bloomberg shows US import and export volumes dramatically slowed in the weeks leading up to the shutdowns of US cities.

Former White House economist Phil Levy told Bloomberg that the US economy is expected to fall 'very sharply' over the second quarter, calling it an "unprecedented decline…because of the speed at which it is happening."

"If we are already starting to match Great Recession statistics, that means we are on pace for the modern record," said Levy, now the chief economist at freight logistics company Flexport.

With the world's largest economy: the US, and the second-largest economy: China, still entangled in virus-related shutdowns, then it makes sense why A.P. Moller-Maersk A/S, the world's largest container line, told customers on Thursday that demand for containerized shipping will be lower well into April.

The US has now become the epicenter of the virus outbreak, surpassing the total number of confirmed Chinese cases on Thursday. However, there is reason to believe that India could see a surge in cases and deaths in weeks ahead, as nearly one billion people have been forced into lockdown.

As for Europe – Italy, Spain, Germany, France, the UK, and Switzerland, have seen a surge in cases and deaths in the last month. The pandemic is disrupting not just supply but also demand, creating twin shocks, damaging all developed world, and many emerging markets.

The collapse in world trade is happening all at once, and very quickly – this is a once in a generation shock.

We'll leave you with this question: Can central banks, unleashing MMT and helicopter money, save the world from a depression?

https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/unprecedented-decline-world-trade-collapse-worst-generation

The Fed Can't Fix What's Broken

The Federal Reserve is poised to spray trillions of dollars into the U.S. economy once a massive aid package to fight the coronavirus and its aftershocks is signed into law. These actions are unprecedented, going beyond anything it did during the 2008 financial crisis in a sign of the extraordinary challenge facing the nation.” – Bloomberg

Currently, the Federal Reserve is in a fight to offset an economic shock bigger than the financial crisis, and they are engaging every possible monetary tool within their arsenal to achieve that goal. The Fed is no longer just a “last resort” for the financial institutions, but now are the lender for the broader economy.

There is just one problem.

The Fed continues to try and stave off an event that is a necessary part of the economic cycle, a debt revulsion.

John Maynard Keynes contended that:

“A general glut would occur when aggregate demand for goods was insufficient, leading to an economic downturn resulting in losses of potential output due to unnecessarily high unemployment, which results from the defensive (or reactive) decisions of the producers.”

In other words, when there is a lack of demand from consumers due to high unemployment, then the contraction in demand would force producers to take defensive actions to reduce output. Such a confluence of actions would lead to a recession.

On Thursday, initial jobless claims jumped by 3.3 million. This was the single largest jump in claims ever on record. The chart below shows the 4-week average to give a better scale.

This number will be MUCH worse next week as many individuals are slow to file claims, don’t know how, and states are slow to report them.

The importance is that unemployment rates in the U.S. are about to spike to levels not seen since the “Great Depression.” Based on the number of claims being filed, we can estimate that unemployment will jump to 20%, or more, over the next quarter as economic growth slides 8%, or more. (I am probably overly optimistic.)

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https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/fed-cant-fix-whats-broken