From the looks of it the world is going to watch Netflix (+3.66%) movies on televisions powered by First Solar's (+4.91%) panels for the foreseeable future. These two stocks are the only S&P 500 names gaining amid the 2.50% decline this morning. The decline is not surprising, following Japan's 10.55% sell-off and general global anxiety for a variety of reasons: civil unrest, sovereign debt, earthquakes, a tsunami and potential nuclear catastrophe... take your pick.
For additional perspective we took a look at some of the more significant natural and man made disasters over the last sixty years. Some of the events were admittedly "cherry-picked." Both the Chernobyl disaster in the Ukraine and Hurricane Katrina in the US resulted in comparatively minor loss of life, but the psychological and financial impacts were perhaps more significant.
As shown, the performance following such events is mixed. Hurrican Katrina had relatively little impact on stocks, whereas Chernobyl resulted in a 3.1% decline over the following week. On average the S&P 500 is down 2.75% over the following six months; excluding the Myanmar cyclone and the 2008 Chinese earthquake stocks gain an average of 3.48%.