US vote twist spooks stock markets
ricky l22 seconds ago
The World market and the US market look unfavorably to Donald Trump Presidential candidacy.
But the alarming reality is that, many Americans ignore the fact that Donald Trump will harm US Economy that will consequently harm the World Economy.
The latest twist is causing hurt - unintentionally or intentionally.
ricky l21 seconds ago
UK Brexit is a terrible mistake that have a big negative impact on UK economy.
Donald Trump will be the similar phenomenon of "Brexit" to US Economy. Hopefully, Americans will vote soberly come 8 Nov 2016 - so as not to trigger a "Brexit phenomenon" in US.
Else with EU and US whack with "Brexit phenomenon, the raw Capitalism adverse effect phenomenon" --- impact to World Economy will be a terrible consequences - and the West influence on the World will diminish.
The market doesn't care who wins the election unless it's Donald Trump
Myles Udland
November 1, 2016
The stock market doesn’t really care who wins the US election.
Unless that person is Donald Trump.
Late Friday, news broke that the FBI would look into more of Hillary Clinton’s emails uncovered as part of the Bureau’s investigation of Anthony Weiner latest “sexting” scandal. In keeping with the theme of this election, these headlines are one part comedy, one part tragedy.
Following the news, markets sold off.
Not in an aggressive fashion — or, as one candidate might say, “big league” — but enough that it reveals the market’s clear preference for a Hillary Clinton presidency.
This is not to say that the market really prefers the policies of a Clinton presidency. The market itself does not have a political view. Rather, this sell off indicates the market’s view on what a Clinton administration most likely represents — more of the same — against the unknown of a Trump administration.
In other words, Clinton provides a modicum of certainty to markets; Trump is the wild card.
Markets hate uncertainty. And in the short-run, it means volatility.
If you open the average Wall Street research note these days you’ll find estimates of a Clinton victory sitting somewhere between 60%-80%. Nate Silver at the widely-followed prediction site 538 pegs Clinton’s chances of winning at around 76%.
In a note to clients earlier this month, Ian Shepherdson at Pantheon Macro wrote that under the most likely election scenario — Clinton wins the White House, Democrats take a small majority in the Senate, Republicans retain a smaller majority in the House — we’ll have gridlock from day one.
“We think the chance of a major infrastructure spending bill is very small, because almost all Republicans will oppose it,” Shepherdson wrote.
So there goes the kind of massive infrastructure package that could jolt bond markets or the US labor market, as some analysts have argued. Instead, we’ll likely get some incremental progress on the US government’s fiscal stance, which has been negative for growth over the last several years.
Of course, both Trump and Clinton have made big economic promises — Trump is going to repeal Obamacare, cut corporate taxes, build a wall, spend $1 trillion on infrastructure, while Clinton will raise taxes, spend $275 billion on infrastructure, and raise the national minimum wage — but the last decade or so of US political wrangling has conditioned markets to fade any promises.
The global-economy-saving TARP bill, after all, was voted down the first time. (This event was followed by a 778 point plunge in the Dow.)
But I think the market’s reaction to Friday’s latest round of Clinton email headlines once again sheds light on the absurdist way people in and around financial services talk about the “stock market.” As if “the market” is a coherent, thinking, feeling entity and not a reflection of what investors think a collection of certain businesses is worth.
But so the entity we refer to as “the market” is, in my view, agnostic to the politics of either Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump. The market will roll with whatever punches are landed by the winning candidate, and whoever wins the next election and the election after that. Businesses will be valued or re-valued, regulations will be put in place or shot down, and so on.
What markets don’t like, however, is uncertainty.
Just think about how often a company is penalized or rewarded for providing negative or positive guidance on its upcoming financial results. Investors love guideposts and they are trusted implicitly.
Looking at markets and what they seem to prefer, then, what we learned Friday is that a Trump presidency is viewed skeptically. A Trump presidency cannot provide forward guidance. A Trump presidency is viewed as uncertain.
And this is what markets don’t like.
—
Myles Udland is a writer at Yahoo Finance.
Race tightening, Clinton relies on firewall of support
LISA LERER and JONATHAN LEMIRENovember 1, 2016
WASHINGTON (AP) — Hillary Clinton is pushing her supporters to cast early ballots in battleground states, as Donald Trump tries to make up ground with intensified attacks following the FBI's renewed examination of her email practices.
As her national lead shrinks in the final week of the race, Clinton is relying on a firewall of support from women and minority voters in demographically diverse swing states. On Tuesday in rallies across Florida, she plans to hit hard at the treatment of women by Trump, who has been accused of repeatedly sexually harassing and even assaulting them.
She will be introduced by Alicia Machado, the winner of Trump's 1996 Miss Universe crown whom he has repeatedly insulted for her weight gain.
With more than 23 million ballots already cast through early voting, it's unclear whether Trump has the time or organizational capacity to improve his standing enough over the next week to win the White House.
While Clinton's newest email controversy may help Trump pick up support in older, whiter states like Ohio and Iowa, the Republican nominee still faces a narrow pathway to winning the 270 electoral votes — one that includes defending states like Arizona and Utah that Republicans have won for decades.
Even as the White House remains an uphill climb, Republicans see the email exchanges as a new opportunity to win over voters in the dozens of down-ballot races that will determine House and Senate control next year.
House Speaker Paul Ryan, who told Fox News he voted for Trump last week, warned that electing Clinton and a Democratic-controlled Congress would be "the worst of all possible things."
"For those of us who lived through the 1990s, it's sort of a feeling like deja vu," he said. "This is what life with the Clintons looks like. It's always a scandal, then there's an investigation."
Both campaigns argued Tuesday they were on the path to victory.
"We're running like we're 20 points behind," said Clinton campaign manager Robby Mook. "We are going to win this election, but it's important that every one of our supporters turns out."
"We're in great shape. We're on offense everywhere," said Trump deputy campaign manager David Bossie. "There's an enthusiasm gap for their voters." Both spoke on ABC's "Good Morning America."
Clinton's campaign has spent nearly two years developing an extensive organizing apparatus, building off the political machine that twice boosted President Barack Obama to victory. Her team has pounded the airwaves with advertising, assembled an expansive voter data file and constructed a nationwide political organization that dwarfs her opponent's.
On Tuesday, it released a new ad featuring video footage of Trump making sexist and degrading statements about women. "Anyone who does what he does is unfit to be president," reads text on the final shot of the spot, which her campaign says will run in eight battleground states.
Her team is focused on pushing voters to the polls for early voting in critical states such as Florida, Nevada and Colorado, where one-third of the expected ballots have already been cast. The Democratic presidential nominee and her allies in a dozen battleground states have more than 4,800 people knocking on doors, making phone calls and otherwise working to support her candidacy.
The New York businessman over the past year has instead depended on massive rallies and free media coverage to drive his outsider candidacy. This week, he's devoting his most valuable resource — his time — to states where polls suggest he's trailing Clinton by significant margins.
Trump had two rallies Monday in Michigan, a state that last went for a Republican presidential nominee in 1988. On Tuesday, he's scheduled to appear with running mate Mike Pence in Wisconsin, which hasn't backed a Republican for president since Ronald Reagan's re-election in 1984.
"Her election would mire our government and our country in a constitutional crisis that we cannot afford," he declared Monday in Grand Rapids, Michigan, pointing to the FBI's examination as evidence the former secretary of state might face a criminal trial as president.
Clinton, defending herself from the new FBI examination, focused Monday on battleground Ohio, a state Trump's team concedes he must win and where he shows signs of a possible victory.
"There is no case here," Clinton insisted. "Most people have decided a long time ago what they think about all this."
Mook, her campaign manager, has decried what he called a "blatant double standard" following a CNBC report that FBI Director James Comey opposed releasing details about possible Russian interference in the U.S. election because it was too close to Election Day. Comey issued a letter to congressional leaders on Friday about the FBI's new effort into Clinton's correspondence.
The AP has not confirmed the CNBC report. The FBI declined comment Monday.
Meanwhile, the ongoing mystery of Trump's tax returns arose again. The New York Times reported Monday night that in the 1990s, Trump avoided paying potentially hundreds of millions of dollars in taxes in a way even his own lawyers considered questionable, using a maneuver Congress explicitly banned in 2004. Trump spokeswoman Hope Hicks said Trump's approach was appropriate.
As for Trump's charge that a Clinton election might prompt "a constitutional crisis," the Justice Department's office of legal counsel said in 1973 that criminally prosecuting a president would unconstitutionally undermine the executive branch. A 2000 memo reached a similar conclusion. Presidents can face civil lawsuits.
___
Associated Press writers Julie Pace in Kent, Ohio, Steve Peoples and Sam Hananel in Washington contributed to this report.