Stock trading was halted in the moments after the opening bell Monday as the Dow Jones Industrial Average opened down around 2,000 points amid coronavirus fears.
It did not get any better on Monday.
The Dow closed down 2,013 points at 23,851, marking the largest single-day drop in the market's history.
The Dow has lost nearly 6,000 points from a high of 29,551 from just last month, which is nearly a 20 percent overall drop in the market's value.
Trading was halted for 15 minutes in the moments after the opening bell, and trading resumed at about 9:50 a.m. ET. Following the trading halt, the Dow recovered somewhat before another mid-afternoon loss put it back 2,000 points on the day.
The 2,000 point loss amounted to a 7.9 percent loss.
According to CBS News, the stock market has built-in "circuit breakers" in order to quell investor's fears when the stock market tanks. The market will pause again for 15 minutes should the Dow suffer a 13 percent loss, and would pause for the remainder of the day in the event of a 20 percent loss.
According to The Associated Press, shares in Asia and the Mideast and U.S. futures were down sharply Monday morning and reports on the health of the economies of Japan and China are stirring more unease.
The virus has ground China's economy to a halt as the number of confirmed cases in the country nears 100,000. Over the weekend, Italy has forced 16 million people into quarantine to prevent the spread of the disease, resulting in a massive economic slowdown.
Cases in the United States have soared above 500, and officials worry the disease could spread further in the weeks ahead.
