In only four days of trading this week, the main market index of the Zagreb Stock Exchange tumbled by more than 21 percent, wiping off more than €2 billion in stock value amid extreme volatility in global markets caused by the coronavirus epidemic.

On Thursday morning, the Crobex (CBX) composite index, which tracks market performance of the 15 largest companies listed, dropped 10 percent in the opening 15 minutes, triggering a circuit-breaker. Although restarted, trading was suspended again until end of day only hours later.

At closing on Thursday, the index was at 1,429 points, or 21.5 percent down compared to Monday morning, at its lowest level since 2009.

Over only four days of trading, 16.2 billion kuna (€2.1 billion) have been wiped off from local stock prices amid massive sell-off triggered by panic in global markets.

Meanwhile, in a historic day for Wall Street, the 30-stock index Dow Jones plummeted 10 percent on Thursday, with S&P 500 index plunging 9 percent. It was the worst single-day result in more than 30 years, unseen since the Black Monday stock market crash of 1987.

And it was even worse in European markets, as Frankfurt’s DAX and Paris’ CAC40 indices both plunged over 12 percent, while London’s FTSE 100 shed 10.9 percent.

(€1 = 7.55 kuna)

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