COVID-19 pandemic: How stocks are performing 2 years later

Yahoo Finance Live's Julie Hyman and Brian Sozzi discuss how stocks are performing two years after the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Video Transcript

JULIE HYMAN: We are marking yet another sort of two year anniversary, if you will. The World Health Organization two years ago today technically declared COVID-19 a pandemic.

TEDROS ADHANOM GHEBREYESUS: We have therefore made the assessment that COVID-19 can be characterized as a pandemic. Pandemic is not a word to use lightly.

JULIE HYMAN: Indeed not a word that they use lightly. And we have seen quite clearly the consequences of the pandemic. As we look at the numbers here, even as in the United States we are still in the process of demasking right now, but if you look at the cases around the globe, which Johns Hopkins has been tracking, 452 million cases, or what have been recorded. More than 6 million people dead. And we still have an elevated death rate here in the United States above and beyond what it would normally be were it not for COVID.

So something to keep in mind here. Of course, we also have been watching vaccine developments. We continue to watch the millions of vaccines, of course, have been produced around the world. Over 10 billion doses have been administered worldwide. Now, as all of this has happened, you and I have been watching the markets. I was just looking at the S&P 500 two-year chart, Sozz.

And since this day two years ago, we have seen stocks rise. There's been obviously quite a lot of volatility more recently. There was obviously a very big drop in stocks at the onset of the pandemic. But all told, we've still recovered pretty nicely, even if recent days have been tough on investors, right?

BRIAN SOZZI: Julie, I was just lost in my thoughts a little bit here. And I just realized that I found my first gray hair during the pandemic. And I remember that was a tough day for me because I never had one before. But nonetheless, on these stock prices, look, you pull up Zoom, DocuSign, Peloton, and Dropbox, they all have what I call bulging bicep charts here.

They've all looked like this, and now back along like that, where Peloton, DocuSign, Zoom, Dropbox, all these pandemic plays are essentially you have stock prices back to where they are pre-pandemic. And when they were all hot or at that bicep moment, that was, I believe, really at the height of the pandemic in mid 2020 and then a few months after that where you thought these companies were going to change the world.

Zoom shares just went through the roof on this thought there would be no more offices. We would never go back to them. DocuSign. We would never sign another agreement. I think we're learning from that earnings report today that is not necessarily the case. Peloton. All gyms would be closed. We'd be riding sweaty bikes in our whole house. So again, it's been fascinating to see these stock moves essentially go back to what they were trading at pre-pandemic.

JULIE HYMAN: I love the bulging bicep I don't think that's a technical indicator that I've ever heard [INTERPOSING VOICES]

BRIAN SOZZI: It is now.

JULIE HYMAN: --mention here.

BRIAN SOZZI: I just copyrighted it.

JULIE HYMAN: As a Marvel fan, it makes me think of Captain America a little bit, right, when he went from pre-Captain America to the transformation. It would be like then if he was transformed back, I suppose, in the case of these stocks.