Most of the G-20 economies around the world have  effectively entered (or soon will do) the red zone of recession, violently pushed there by the coronavirus pandemic. Recent Wine Economist columns (click here) have accordingly focused on the direct economic impacts of this crisis on the wine industry.

I hope you have found the analysis helpful in thinking through the current situation. Events have moved so fast that it is difficult (impossible?) to keep up!

Today’s column steps back and looks at important side-effects — economic contagion — that need to be considered. Here are brief surveys of the wine impacts of three forces: exchange rates, online activity, and travel and tourism.

The Greenback Also Rises

The shock of the coronavirus’s worldwide spread produced a rush to safety — or anything that remotely resembles safety — in the financial markets. As in past crises, this means a demand for U.S. dollars and dollar-denominated assets driven by a combination of confidence in the U.S. economy and policies, a lack of confidence in other economic actors, or a simple desire for maximum liquidity. The liquidity factor is huge right now.

The dollar’s value therefore has risen dramatically. The Federal Reserve’s wise decision to expand dollar swap line operations with foreign central banks has helped reduce the dollar shortage and increase liquidity, but the fundamental problem remains.

A strong dollar makes imports cheaper for buyers here in the United States and this fact will become important if the exchange value persists. Imported wine will be relatively more cost competitive once the smoke clears. That’s good news for consumers, but cold comfort for domestic growers and producers. And U.S. wine exports — which have become even more important because of the domestic wine surplus — will become a harder sell due to the strong dollar.

Bulk wine from Argentina is incredibly cheap for U.S. buyers and the strong dollar is part of the story. The Argentina peso was trading at over 64 pesos per dollar late last week, for example, compared with about 42 pesos one year earlier, which is a dramatic change. Several factors besides the coronavirus, which accounted for perhaps 25% of the currency depreciation, are at work here.

The rising dollar has eroded the exchange value of the Euro and British Pound, but its biggest impacts have been on emerging market currencies. This is especially important because these countries borrow in U.S. dollars, so the local currency cost of foreign debt is magnified when the dollar strengthens.

Fragile is the word I would use to describe the emerging markets today. Mexico, for example, faces a potential health crisis, an economic crisis because they rely upon petroleum exports, which have fallen in value dramatically, and possible issues with both domestic and international debt because of the strong dollar.  Argentina faces the same problems, minus the issue of oil exports, but at heightened levels.

Even if the developed countries are able to stabilize their economies, as they are trying to do with truly heroic monetary and fiscal policies, the fragile nature of the emerging markets represents a risk to the global economic stability.

The textbook says that a  rising dollar isn’t bad or good … it is a package of  economic benefits and costs, opportunities and risks. The risks get my special attention these days, because we have all the economic risk we can use right now!

Is There an App for That?

I call it the Magnification Effect. When we look back on the coronavirus crisis in a few years I suspect that one thing that we will notice is that, while new trends emerged in business and society, the biggest effect was to magnify and accelerate certain patterns that were already there.

Screens and online interactions were already an important factor, especially with younger people who can’t remember a world without them. The further substitution of online for in-person experiences has been strongly encouraged by coronavirus isolation practices.

Will film viewers go back to crowded theaters in the same numbers when the clouds clear? Or will they decide, even more than in the past, that small screens are just fine? I suspect that everyone in the sports and entertainment industries will be watching closely to see what happens next.

Many consumers will have placed their very first online grocery or take-away meal delivery orders during the coronavirus period. Some will never do it again, but others will decide that it is a worthwhile convenience and continue these expenditures.

Do supermarket shoppers buy the same amount of wine when they shop in person versus online ordering? I haven’t seen statistics on this question, but I suspect that the online share is lower. Regulatory issues are to blame in some areas. And the difficulty of bringing the “wine wall experience” online is another.

What happens to wine when a served restaurant meal moves to home delivery? The diner may still drink wine, but it is likely to be a different wine and probably a less expensive one. Maybe its a glass from the box in the fridge? Some wineries depend a great deal on restaurant sales and this will be a particular problem for them and of course the restaurants face lost margins and sales.

No one is surprised that Amazon.com home delivery sales have surged during the coronavirus period. If the Magnification Effect hypothesis is correct, that’s just the tip of the iceberg and wine sales will be affected.

[Not] On the Road Again

Some of the most serious economic impacts of the coronavirus crisis have been on the travel and hospitality sectors. At least one international airline has already been pushed to bankruptcy and no one will be surprised if there are more business failures. The situation grows even darker when you consider the supply chain: grounded flights, canceled aircraft orders, parts and equipment suppliers both big and small squeezed tight, and so on. The impacts will be broad and deep.

Restaurants and hotels are shuttered or just barely keeping the lights on and of course this sector also has supply chain effects that start with direct employees and extend down into all the businesses (including wine, of course) that supply the goods and services that they need to run successfully.

And then there is the cruise ship industry.

What will happen to the planes, trains, ships, hotels, resorts, restaurants, convention centers, and so on once the health crisis has passed and the recession run its course? Certainly the pipeline will refill, but will it be the same? Or will people decide that they don’t really need to move around so much and so far and spend a lot of time exposed to large crowds.

How strong will the movement be to go local instead of global and online versus in person? Those practices were already here, albeit unevenly adopted in different sectors.

Viewing the situation from my perch as a recovering university professor, I sense that this may be a critical moment in some sectors. Many colleges and university, for example, have substituted online classes for in-person teaching for the rest of the current academic year. It is supposed to be a temporary shift — just until the coronavirus crisis has ended. Then it’s back to normal.

But if the online classroom works reasonably well, will it be possible to completely return to the old practices? Or will the nature of higher education change? Many graduate degree programs I’ve seen had significant online components before coronavirus struck.  More will embrace the technology now and it is likely to spread throughout the higher education environment.

This Changes Everything?

Wine may not be the most important sector that will be impacted by local/online trends, but it will need to adjust to them. Wine tourism has emerged as an important industry, especially in the decade since the start of the Great Recession. The United Nations World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) sponsors annual global wine tourism meetings (the 2020 meeting is scheduled for Alentejo, Portugal later this year) that focuses on wine tourism as an economic development tool as well as a profitable business area.

How much will wine tourism and associated industries be affected if global/in-person is replaced significantly by local/online? Too soon to tell, like most things about this crisis. But important to monitor.