BOE Help, Virus Delivers a Blow, U.S. Spending Nod: Eco Day

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Welcome to Thursday, Europe. Here’s the latest news and analysis from Bloomberg Economics to help you start the day:

• Incoming Bank of England chief Andrew Bailey said the central bank will work with the Treasury to help the economy withstand the coronavirus. Market speculation is mounting that the bank will follow the Fed with an emergency rate cut
• The virus outbreak threatens to plunge both France and Italy into recession, and the ripples from a prolonged epidemic could incite a “vicious” spiral of declining markets, European finance ministers have been warned
• Iceland’s economy, which relies on tourism for almost half the country’s export revenue, is in for trouble amid the virus outbreak that is seen destroying the appeal of international travel
• The Czech central bank pushed back against billionaire Prime Minister Andrej Babis’s criticism of its efforts to curb inflation with higher borrowing costs
• The coronavirus is delivering a one-two punch to the world economy, laying it low for months to come and forcing investors to reprice equities and bonds to account for lower company earnings
• South Africa’s central bank sees no need for an emergency meeting on interest rates and will wait for its regular gathering on March 19 to announce a policy decision, Governor Lesetja Kganyago said
• When it comes to supporting the economy from the coronavirus shock in China, cutting interest rates is not the only game in town, or even the main game, writes Chang Shu
• U.S. lawmakers agreed on a $7.8 billion emergency spending bill to fund the government’s response to the coronavirus outbreak. Elsewhere, Australia’s economy is likely to suffer a quarterly contraction for the first time in nine years

To contact the reporter on this story: Anirban Nag in Mumbai at anag8@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Nasreen Seria at nseria@bloomberg.net, Karthikeyan Sundaram, Pradeep Kurup

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