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As fear and panic rises daily due to more cases reported of the Coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak, the Federal Reserve, Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), National Credit Union Administration (NCUA) and Conference of State Bank Supervisors (CSBS) have jointly encouraged financial institutions to meet the needs of customers and members affected by the illness.

“The agencies understand that many financial institutions may face current staffing and other challenges,” said the federal agencies in their joint statement.

The rapid spread and growing fear of the novel coronavirus is disrupting financial markets and devastating the industries that commercial real estate depend on.

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The fallout is starkly displayed at the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach — the two largest in the Western Hemisphere — as fewer and fewer shipments arrive.

Coronavirus,  which first emerged in Wuhan, a port city in the central Hubei province in China in late December, has since emerged on every continent except Antarctica. As health officials work to stem the spread and impact of the health epidemic, which has infected close to 90,000 people and killed more than 3,000 to date, the global business community is grabbling with a potential crisis of its own.

Over the last decade,

Once considered an unlimited bucket of capital for borrowers, CMBS provided a relatively quick and easy financing alternative for capital requirements that weren’t being addressed by the other capital market systems.

Today, CMBS remains the most aggressive and cheapest capital in town, offering interest rates at historic lows. With the treasuries falling into the mid ones and with spreads in the mid to high 100’s, rates on CMBS loans are hovering in the high 2% to low 3% range.

In August we witnessed a classic recessionary signal when yields on long-term bonds fell below that of their short-term counterparts, a phenomenon known as an inverted yield curve. So when the spread between the 10-year and two-year Treasuries turned negative (actually three times in less than two weeks), concerns about the economy’s health began to escalate. Afterall, over the past 50 years the inverted yield curve has been a pretty accurate warning sign of a pending recession.

Developer JPI has received $80 million for the construction of Jefferson on Imperial, a 244-unit luxury multifamily community in South Gate.

The preferred equity and construction financing was arranged by Century City-based Dekel Capital for the project at 10920 Garfield Ave.

Shlomi Ronen, a managing principal at Dekel Capital, said the development is the first new multifamily project in the area in 30 years.