Market briefing --- Catherine Yang (medium)
Election --- Bob (fast)
NYSE --- Julie (slow)
>>good morning and welcome to special u.s. election coverage. i’m catherine yang in hong kong. as part of today’s coverage, we will have live reports every half hour from the u.s. with the latest exit polls in state where is voting has ended. plus, our asian reporters are standing by with special reports on how it may effect economics and business across the region. we have a series of live guests to discuss the issues and interpret the early result. don’t forget, the usually breaking news and business report, we have three live guests in the next hour. first up, the dollar has weakened during the bush president spiff we will talk to a currency strategist for that in 20 minutes. then, we turn our attention to the political issues at stake and the campaign strategies when we talk to a political analyst from prudential. and a stock market strategist will tell us what stock wills benefit from a bush or kerry victory. u.s. television networks have agreed not to report early exit polling results until the polls close in the states.the first polls close in about an hour in u.n. inn and kentucky. in two hour, it will rap up in florida. another key state, ohio, closing the polling booths at 8:00 a.m. hong kong and by 10:00 a.m. tokyo, voting finishes in 28 state. later on, polls closes a 10:00 hong kong. and a final state, alaska, closes at 1:00 p.m. hong kong and 2:00 p.m. tokyo. on wall street, the stocks dropped in last few minutes of trading. the dow erissed gain erased gains to close .2% lower. some exit polls suggest that john kerry is showing a strong effort to unseat president george bush. the nasdaq closed up .2%. it was earlier up as much as 1.2%. some strategists say a bush victory would be more promising for the stock market .
>> we’re looking for up 10% right now. in the next three to six months f president bush win. if senator kerry wins and there is grid lock, dips and comes back up and end up in positive territory. if senator kerry wins and the democrats control at least the senate, we think probably have a market struggling to be flat in the next three to six month.
>> speculation kerry may lead bush in key states pulled the dollar lower against the euro and yen. some say kerry will want a weaker dollar to boost the economy to create job. in the bond market , treasuries rise. speculation of gains for kerry boosted demand as stocks declined. in the oil market , crude dropped 1%, closing below $50 a barrel for the first time in four weeks. asian stocks traded in the u.s. as the bank declined. the a.d.r.’s alled a vanned. a swing in the online futures market puts john kerry ahead of president bush as the candidate trader believe will win the election. some websites have posted what they say exit polls showing kerry leads in the early voting like florida and ohio. kerry, who led bush by 18 percentage points in the iowa electronic market . it’s a not for profit betting system run by the university of iowa. intrade shows kerry leading bush by 16 percentage points. let’s get the latest from mike mckee in new york. we saw line of voters waiting to cast the ballot. what are the experts saying about the turnout?
>> they are saying, cathy, that we’re going to have a very strong vote in the united states. people have been following this election very closely. 90% say they are very interested in the election according to a recent poll. and so the candidates found themselves campaigning until the last moment, making their pitches.
>> today is a day of a new begin. it’s that magic moment when the greatest democracy on the face of the planet gets to show the world how we work.
>> i feel calm. i feel―i am confident that the people, in the judgment of the people.
>> george bush and john kerry who were casting their ballots earlier, we can probably guess for whom, but the vote of an estimated 110 million or more other americans won’t be known for several more hours. after two years of campaigning t voters are at the intersection of money and politics today. reports from around the country, long lines, voters coming out in what may be record number. analysts say turnout may reach 60% that would be the highest since 1968. and that may delay reporting this evening as may some expected legal challenges. polls going into the vote show the race a virtual dead heat. the top issue being the economy. mr. bush and mr. kerry have sharply diverging views on taxes, health care, and social security. and there’s also, as we mentioned, a possibility we may not know tonight who won. traders say having a clearcut winner from today’s presidential election is particularly important for stocks. however, we see americans head to the polls with the dow jones industrials 5.8% off the highs of the year, while the s&p 500 down 1.6% from the same day in february. stocks held back by concerns about record high oil prices, slowing consumer spending, and the pace of growth. in recent days, investors and traders pointing to uncertainty about the election and about whether we’ll have any legal challenge. cathy?
>> mike, how significant is kerry’s lead in the futures markets ?
>> not very significant at this point. going into today’s vote, it told you something about where people thought the election might turn out. but right now the people trading on those markets are reacting to the release of purported exit poll number on the internet on various sites. so it’s not really leading us. it’s just a reaction right now.
>> thanks for that, mike. u.s. stocks broke a six-day winning streak today after late election jitter. traders say investors were looking at that same information and very early and unofficial exit poll numbers that show strength in the numbers of senator john kerry. taking a look at the indexes t s&p 500 closed unchanged. the dow jones down .2%. nasdaq up .25%. julie hyman reports from the new york stock exchange.
>> stocks had been poised for the sixth straight gain in today’s session before we had a late day slide. now, in talking to investors throughout today’s session, they said it wasn’t so important who wins the election as that there was a clearcut outcome. that changed late in the day. we did have traders telling me there were reports on drudgereport.com that kerry was pulling ahead in early exit polling. with that, we saw the markets take a turn for the worse. the dow jones ending .32% lower if s&p 500 ended little changed. remember, this was after earlier, fairly substantial gains. volume fairly healthy. the busiest in a week after investors expected it to be a fairly quiet day. in terms of what investors are saying about the election, we had a analyst at bear stearns weighing in who said while elections will likely add to volatility in the coming week t choice of a president is unlikely to change the trend in the overall market . and he also pointed to the fact we are in a rising interest rate environment and that could weigh on stocks heading into the remainder of the year. something else we heard from u.b.s. and one of their strategists is earnings are more important than the election going into the end of the year and third quarter earnings are looking reasonably good, but it is dependent heavily on economic growth. this weighed on today’s session. finally, want to talk about drug stock. we did see them take a bigger than normal hit helped many part by merck. merck falling after the food and drug administration said the vioxx painkiller may have contributed to an estimated 28,000 heart attacks and deaths from 1999-2003. that combined with that late day kerry news contributing to the drop we saw. i’m julie hyman, bloomberg, at the new york stock exchange.
>> the u.s. federal reserve’s regional bankers are voting with their checkbooks for george w. bush and his republican party. advisors and directors gave $1.4 million to political action committees in the elections as of october 15. those who gave to one party favored republicans over democrats by a 2:1 margin. chairman alan greenspan and others avoid giving money to federal campaign, central bank policy allows lower ranking members to contribute to candidate. lots more to come on u.s. elections. after the break, the impact of the election day on the markets .
