Airline stocks lead huge sell-off as UK reopening sparks Delta panic

As the British government withdrew most Covid restrictions, UK cases approached 50,000 a day — enough to heavily spook the markets

Investors fled tourism and leisure stocks in the biggest sell-off of European shares this year, as fear of infection outweighs Boris Johnson's reopening optimism. 

Tourism and hospitality stocks — from Ryanair to pub group JD Wetherspoon — plummeted on rising concern that the UK’s mass reopening of society will lead to a surge in Delta variant cases and fresh disruption to trading.

Investors fled airline and leisure stocks on Britain's so-called 'Freedom Day', dragging such shares back to the lows they felt last November when the UK was under its second national lockdown.