What is the latest state of play as the vote count continues
The key news on the session so far is that Biden has managed to marginally flip Georgia in his favour with the state nearing the end of its vote count.
Trump's lead in the state had been gradually slipping and the last few batches of the vote count from Clayton County helped to shift the tide in Biden's favour.
So, how does that change the election state of play?
The simple narrative is that Trump needed to hold on to his leads in Georgia and Pennsylvania to keep his chances of winning, since mail-in ballots are largely in favour of Biden with deep blue counties i.e. Clayton and Philadelphia accounting for most of them.
Based on the calls from most major networks, Biden holds 253 electoral college votes and the lead in Georgia means that he could win the state and get to 269 votes.
As such, the best hope for Trump is to tie the election but that means he has to keep his lead in Pennsylvania and flip over Arizona and Nevada.
However, that is a tall order with there still being over 40,000 votes left to be counted in Philadelphia alone and he has been winning the county with an 80% share so far:
Trump's lead in Pennsylvania is just over 18,000 so if Biden draws in 80% of the remaining mail-in ballots count in Philadelphia, he'll have more than enough to flip it.
What does this all mean for the market?
I reckon the initial reaction in futures could be a bit telling. It has been a monster week for equities and the market has breathed a sigh of relief over the past few days expecting the results to turn out as they are playing out right now.
S&P 500 futures are down by 1.1% and that is considerably mild following the gains throughout the week. That said, amid the push higher over the past few days, the market could settle into the narrative of 'buying the rumour, selling the fact' later today.
After all, some profit-taking ahead of the weekend after the massive gains this week wouldn't be the worst idea all things considered.
I mean there's the likelihood that Trump will contest the results and there possibly being a recount in Georgia; not to mention who knows what may happen with the election narrative over the weekend.
