.By Mary Clare Jalonick and Eric Tucker
Sen. Richard Burr, R-N.C., stepped aside as chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee on Thursday after the FBI served a search warrant for his phone as part of an ongoing insider-trading investigation tied to the coronavirus pandemic.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell announced the move, saying he and Burr had agreed it was in the Senate's best interests.
FBI officials showed up at Burr's home with the warrant on Wednesday, marking a significant escalation into the Justice Department's investigation into whether Burr broke the law with a well-timed sale of stocks before the coronavirus caused markets to plummet,
The Justice Department declined to comment. His attorney did not respond to phone and email messages, but said last month that the law is clear that any senator can participate in stock market trading based on public information "as Sen. Burr did."
Lenore Hawkins, chief macro strategist for Tamatica Research, told Cheddar that the combination of the COVID-19 outbreak and the oil price war between Saudi Arabia and Russia is an unprecedented set of circumstances for investors.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average plummeted 1,500 points, or 6%, following similar drops in Europe after a fight among major crude-producing countries jolted investors already on edge about the widening fallout from the outbreak of the new coronavirus.
From Wall Street to Silicon Valley, these are the top stories that moved markets and had investors, business leaders, and entrepreneurs talking this week on Cheddar.
Bond yields fell to more record lows as investors continue to demand safety and unload stocks. The yield on the 10-year Treasury note sank as low as 0.66% as investors worried that economic damage from the spreading virus outbreak will be worse than previously thought.
Cheddar will be following the biggest political headlines as voters head to the polls in critical Super Tuesday primaries.
Dr. William Schaffner of Vanderbilt University said taking steps like sanitizing the subway system "may play a small role in mitigating the transmission of this virus, but it signals to people that we ought to be functioning as we can and doing the things we can do."
Stocks are falling sharply again in midday trading on Wall Street, and bond yields are sinking to more record lows on worries about the economic damage coming from the spreading coronavirus outbreak.
President Donald Trump on Friday signed an $8.3 billion measure to help tackle the coronavirus outbreak that has killed more than a dozen people in the U.S. and infected more than 200.
These are the headlines you Need 2 Know for Friday, March 6, 2020.
U.S. Representative Pete Aguilar of California voted yes on an $8.3 billion coronavirus emergency package bill, a much higher figure than the $2.5 billion requested by the White House.
