New York (AFP)

The New York Stock Exchange gave ground on Monday for its first meeting of the year, worried about the acceleration of Covid-19 cases and apprehending the results of a key US senatorial election on Tuesday in Georgia.

According to provisional results at the close, the index of flagship stocks Dow Jones concluded at 30,223.89 points, down 1.25%.

The Nasdaq, with strong technological coloring, lost 1.47% to 12,698.45 points.

And the broader S&P 500 index dropped 1.48% to 3,700.65 points.

The three indices, which had yet started the session in the green, lost more than 2.5% in the middle of the session before regaining some ground.

The pandemic of the new coronavirus has killed at least 1,843,631 people around the world and the United States began the year 2021 by crossing a new grim threshold with 20 million recorded cases of Covid-19 since the start of the pandemic.

The United Kingdom also announced Monday evening the re-containment of England until mid-February to fight against the spread of the new variant of the coronavirus, which is more contagious.

"I believe the continuation of the Covid-19 cases and Tuesday's elections in Georgia have rocked the market," as investors are uncertain of the results of this dual senatorial election in the state of southern Georgia, told AFP Quincy Krosby of Prudential.

"There is growing concern that Democrats could win these seats," added the analyst, which would allow Joe Biden's party to control both the House of Representatives and the Senate.

"This could have implications for taxes, regulations on the technology sector, banking and energy."

So far, also said Chris Low of FNH Financial, investors "were very happy that the elections resulted in a divided government where nothing radical could be voted", with a cohabitation between a White House and the Democratic House and a Senate controlled by the Republicans.

"But brokers are starting to get nervous about the risk that a party will have a clear path to do things," he added.

All sectors of the S&P 500, except just balanced energy, were down sharply, starting with real estate (-3.29%), services and industrials.

Boeing fell 5.25% after a poor rating from an analyst.

American Airlines (-4.06%) and United Airlines (-3.75%) followed.

Within tech, Apple led the descent, finishing down 2.47%, followed by Google (Alphabet) down 1.35% as the tech giant's staff want to form a union, a first among the major groups in the sector.

Amazon (-2.16%), Microsoft (-2.13%), Facebook (-1.54%) all concluded clearly in the red.

Among the other titles of the day, MGM Resorts International plunged 5.68% after making an offer on the British group of games, Entain, for 8 billion pounds, considered too weak by it.

The Roku streaming platform lost 4.25% as it is in negotiations to buy the catalog of Quibi, the short video streaming service launched unsuccessfully in April in North America by Jeffrey Katzenberg, a former Disney boss .

The title of Herbalife (+ 3.95%) benefited from the sale by Carl Icahn, its largest shareholder to date, for about $ 600 million of its shares in the American specialist in food supplements.

© 2021 AFP