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Market areas could change greatly depending on who wins
Iowa

Market areas could change greatly depending on who wins

One of the most hyped market-moving events of the year is here.

Americans went to the polls on Tuesday to vote in a presidential election between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris. The outcome could have implications for financial markets for the rest of the year and beyond.

For the broader market, Wall Street strategists see the biggest risk in a contested election where the outcome will be unclear for weeks.

“A close, contentious election is the biggest tail risk we see for U.S. stocks in the coming days and months, although we also suspect a Democratic victory could also surprise U.S. equity investors,” wrote Lori Calvasina of RBC Capital Markets in a note to customers Tuesday morning.

According to Calvasina, market strategists are discussing the possible unraveling of a so-called Trump trade if the former president does not win on Tuesday evening. Last month, as the odds in the betting market moved in Trump’s favor, certain sectors rallied on the belief that the former president would improve these companies’ prospects if elected. For example: finance and cryptocurrencies.

When a new poll showed Kamala Harris leading Trump in Iowa on Friday, some of those trades began to change. Bitcoin recently hit a high of $71,000 per coin before briefly slipping below $67,000 after the survey was published. Likewise, the financial sector (XLF) was the second-worst performing sector on Monday, after leading the 11 sectors in October, possibly due to the belief that Trump’s policies would be more favorable for banks.

Conversely, strategists have pointed to other trades that have underperformed over the last month that could outperform if Harris wins. In a note to clients Sunday evening, Morgan Stanley Chief Investment Officer Mike Wilson wrote that consumer goods companies that could be hurt by Trump’s tariff policies had priced in potential negative impacts ahead of the election.

“We expect consumer stocks and renewable energy stocks affected by tariffs to outperform in the near term,” Wilson wrote, referring to a Harris victory scenario that sees a red-blue split in Congress. “Financial, industrial and commodity-sensitive sectors could initially underperform.”

Wilson added that a divided Congress could limit the durability of the measures.

“In our view, market leadership in the split congressional results will likely depend on the business cycle, the Fed’s response function and industry fundamentals post-election,” Wilson wrote.

Over the last month, there has been much debate about what is driving stock markets as investors digest positive third-quarter results, the start of the Federal Reserve’s easing cycle and a series of data releases showing that the U.S. economy is still solid grows.

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