Stocks and oil prices fall as Moderna CEO says vaccines will struggle with Omicron
CNN
Global stocks and oil prices are falling again after a brief respite Monday from the heavy sell-off triggered by the emergence of the Omicron coronavirus variant.
Stocks in Asia Pacific and Europe slid, Dow futures were down 1% and oil prices fell about 2% as more countries reported cases of the variant and imposed new travel restrictions. The mood was also dampened by a warning from Moderna CEO Stéphane Bancel that current vaccines will struggle with Omicron.
"There is no world, I think, where [the effectiveness] is the same level . . . we had with [the] Delta [variant]," Bancel said in an interview with the Financial Times published on Tuesday. "I think it's going to be a material drop. I just don't know how much because we need to wait for the data. But all the scientists I've talked to ... are like, 'This is not going to be good'."