Coronavirus to cause 2.5% fall in global economy growth - UN

The growth of the coronavirus epidemic poses a danger not only in the field of health care, but also can reduce the growth of the world economy by 2.5%, Director of Globalization and Development Strategies of the UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) Richard Kozul-Wright said at a press conference. According to the economist, central banks will not be able to cope with this crisis alone. The decline in asset prices, the weakening of aggregate demand, the deterioration of the debt crisis may trigger a further deterioration of the situation, so another powerful collapse in the value of assets cannot be ruled out. The so-called COVID-19 shock will cause a recession in some countries and drive global annual growth this year down to below 2.5 percent, a threshold of recession for the global economy, Kozul-Wright said. However, the expert excludes the repetition of the banking crisis of 2008, as the world banking system is now in a more stable form.