COVID-19.. Europe’s luxury stocks fall

Luxury European stocks including LVMH and Gucci owner Kering slumped, as a new wave of coronavirus spread in China weighed on confidence, leading to additional declines in luxury goods shares erasing $56 billion in sector shares over the past two days.

The shares of Hermes International and Burberry also fell amid concern over demand from China, a major market for luxury goods companies.

China is likely to see a new wave of Covid-19, with nearly 65 million infections per week, at the end of June.

Chinese media reported that the rise in cases across China, since late April, is expected to result in 40 million infections a week, by the end of May, before peaking at 65 million, in June.

Speaking about the reasons for the expected second wave, the agency said immunization and prevention measures had diminished among the country’s 1.4 billion people nearly six months after Beijing abruptly ended its Zero Covid restrictions, leading to the coronavirus outbreak.