As we await the result of the U.S. election, Donald Trump is already claiming victory and demanding votes stop being counted. At present, Joe Biden (09:30 GMT) has the most electoral votes, but President Trump is claiming the election to be “a fraud on the American public”.
Speaking at the White House Trump asserted that “this is a very big moment. This is major fraud on our nation. We want the law to used in a proper manner. So we’ll be going to the U.S. Supreme Court. We want all voting to stop. We don’t want them to find any ballots at four o’clock in the morning and add them to the list.” Trump did however contradict himself, arguing that votes should be counted in Arizona, where he is trailing, but not in states where he is leading.
With uncertainty omnipresent in the markets, naturally, volatility has been rife this morning and overnight. GBPUSD opened Tuesday’s session at 1.2964 and made a steady rise as the dollar weakened off as voting started stateside. The pair closed at 1.3049 but surged on through the night, reaching a high of 1.3140 just past midnight (GMT). As we start Wednesday cable has fallen significantly from that handle, opening at 1.2935.
EURUSD also saw some upside in yesterdays session. The pair opened the day cautiously at 1.1687 but managed to surpass that mark, going above 1.17 and closing Tuesday at 1.1724.
As for GBPEUR, the pair has also seen heightened volatility. The pair opened yesterday at 1.1093 and closed above that handle at 1.1129. The pair spiked to reach 2-month highs in the night as sentiment on Brexit grew more positive. Bloomberg reported yesterday evening that Brexit negotiators will begin a brief break on Wednesday, with talks likely to resume in London on Sunday. James Slack, the Prime Minister’s Official Spokesperson, still persists that a deal is “our overriding priority… we are committed to working through the joint committee process to find a satisfactory outcome for both sides.”
On the data front, there are a number of medium tier releases from the UK, U.S. and Europe. In the morning we have Markit PMI’s for October from the Eurozone, Germany, Spain, Italy and the UK. Then in the afternoon from the US we have Balance of Trade, ISM Non-Manufacturing Survey, and ADP Employment Change.
