Is It Over Yet?

Tuesday, November 8, 2016

The South and the Farm Belt are solidly red. The Northeast and West Coast are solidly blue. Great Lakes are mixed. Today lays plain the U.S.’s political landscape, as it always does the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November every four years.

We’ve had old presidents, young(ish) presidents, fat presidents, thin presidents, tall and short presidents, presidents of Irish descent, Dutch descent and even our first African American. Now we stand to elect either our first female president or our first non-politician president. Whichever way the scales tip, it will be an historic occasion. Which leaves me with one question:

Is it [bleep]ing over yet?

A year and a half of insults, half-truths, outright lies, rumors, intrigue, passions and — every once in awhile — policy matters. It’s a multi-billion-dollar industry, this business of electing a president in this country, and those involved mean to squeeze every last dime out of it. Personally, I’m still getting emails imploring me to donate to various campaigns; what good would an extra $100 or $1000 do for candidates now that the polls are already open?

Barring the three-ring circus that was Election 2000, by this time tomorrow we will have a new president — either Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton. Market analysts have priced in a 4% bump for stocks if Clinton wins (though yesterday’s big up-day has likely priced in nearly half of this already) while a Trump win means the market will likely take a 7% hit.

Trump’s policies, where they are concrete, represent a dramatic shift from current policy, which means greater uncertainty. The stock market does not like uncertainty. Wall Street’s preference would be for a Clinton victory (provided she keeps most economic policies in place) but the Republican Party to retain both houses of Congress — the better to keep gridlock with.

Small Business sentiment this morning came out with a read of 94.9 in October, an improvement from 94.1 in September but off the historic highs.

Valeant Pharma (NYSE:VRX) has tumbled 16% in the pre-market following a top- and bottom-line miss in quarterly earnings. The company has also cut full-year forecasts, and now trades at a multi-year low.

CVS (NYSE:CVS) is also down 16% in early trading. The company beat earnings estimates but missed on revenues, as did PerkinElmer (NYSE:PKI) . D.R. Horton (NYSE:DHI) fell short of expectations but bumped up its dividend yield 25%. Wayfair (NYSE:W) beat estimates and expressed optimism for the long term.

Mark Vickery
Senior Editor

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