Donald Trump Positive For COVID-19, Can Joe Biden Get It Too?

US President, Donald Trump. (Photo: Instagram @realdonaldtrump)

JAKARTA - The global and national economies are still full of uncertainty. This is because the main problem in the health sector, namely the COVID-19 pandemic, has not been resolved.

In the midst of these problems, the government must also be aware of the impact that will arise from the news that the President of the United States (US) Donald Trump is positively infected with COVID-19.

Chief Economist of Bank Central Asia (BCA), David Sumual, said the news that the number one person in Uncle Sam's country was infected with the virus, of course, will add to the uncertainty regarding the Indonesian economy.

After Trump tested positive for COVID-19, the rupiah exchange rate against the United States dollar continued to weaken. This weekend, the rupiah closed down 0.20 percent or 30 points to a level of Rp14,865 per US dollar.

According to him, this condition was caused by the growing concern of financial market players about the uncertainty of handling COVID-19 in the US. As a result, market players continued to leave assets that were considered risky, such as the rupiah and again preferred to hold cash dollars. In this way, the dollar value continues to rise.

"The uncertainty is very high. This afternoon Trump has contracted COVID-19, the Indonesian stock market is weakening, the rupiah is too. These must all have consequences," he said, during a virtual KiTa Dialogue, Friday, October 2.

Moreover, he said, Indonesia's current economy has not shown any improvement as expected. Not only that, David said he was worried, because during the presidential debate in the US yesterday, none of the candidates, both Trump and Joe Biden, used masks as a means of personal protection (PPE).

"Especially during the debate between the two candidates who did not wear a mask. It could be that Biden was also tested. So this condition of uncertainty, starting from politics in the US, the capital market, has an impact," he said.

David hopes that the government will soon have a mitigation plan for the impact that comes from uncertainty outside of COVID-19. One of them, United States politics.

"The political conditions in America and the capital market have a definite influence. Second, the trade war is a problem, because it causes global trade figures to continue to decline. So commodity prices also have an effect," he said.