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NOW:

Yahoo Finance 2020 election coverage

What to expect from markets under a contested 2020 election

Brian Cheung
·Reporter
·3 mins read

For more business and finance explainers, check out our Yahoo U page.

Markets could be in for a bumpy ride with the many possible outcomes in Tuesday’s election, including scenarios where the outcome isn’t known for days.

With tight races in several states and indication from the Trump campaign that they may fight the results if former Vice President Joe Biden wins, Americans may be bracing for the possibility of not knowing the winner on Tuesday.

Markets may have already priced in the assumption of a contested election, with JPMorgan strategist John Normand writing in late September that a battle over the election results is their “baseline” expectation.

The most recent example of a contested election was the 2000 race between Al Gore and George W. Bush.

A close contest in Florida threw the election results into flux, resulting in the S&P 500 falling as deeply as 8% as legal battles erupted over a recount (the VIX, a measure of investor fear, peaked at almost 30).

The S&P 500 fell deeply as 8% and the Dow Jones Industrial Average as much as 5.5% in the weeks following the 2000 election.
The S&P 500 fell deeply as 8% and the Dow Jones Industrial Average as much as 5.5% in the weeks following the 2000 election.

The Supreme Court ended the uncertainty with its 5-4 decision on December 12 that effectively declared Bush the winner, by which point the VIX had fallen below 25. Still, the S&P remained 5% below its level before Election Day, although markets may have been driven by other factors.

A similar selloff could occur if the 2020 election results get dragged out. Chris Murphy at Susquehanna Derivative Strategy illustrated this possibility by looking at PredictIt betting markets, which as of Monday priced a 75% chance of the election being called by the end of this week.

He then used SPDR S&P 500 ETF options pricing, to see how bettors were matching prices on put and call options (a strategy known as at-the-money straddles). Pinpointing those options helped Murphy glean that markets implied a 3.6% move for the week, and combined the PredictIt bets to draw the possibility of the SPY falling 7% in the event of a contested election.

Murphy cautions that the rough calculation is not a prediction but a “thought exercise” to frame an event as impactful as not knowing who won the election.

This election is different

One unique aspect of this election is the fact that it is occurring in the middle of a global pandemic and the deepest recession since the Great Depression.

At stake: a fiscal package to get relief to households struggling to make ends meet and businesses unable to recover revenues lost during the shutdowns.

“Now that a pre-election stimulus plan is in question, a prolonged period of uncertainty would be a further detriment to the U.S. economy,” UBS Chief investment officer Mark Haefele wrote on October 15.

But even with concerns over heightened volatility, strategists are advising against dramatically shifting allocations, depending on investment horizon.

For example, Fidelity’s Jurrien Timmer has written that regardless of political party and who is in power, the first two years of a presidential term tend to produce below-average returns whereas the second half of an administration tends to produce above-average returns.

Stocks usually end higher at the end of an administration, regardless of party or Congressional composition. Source: Fidelity, FMRCo analysis of monthly data since 1789 (mix of S&P 500, Dow Jones Industrial Average, & Cowles Commission)
Stocks usually end higher at the end of an administration, regardless of party or Congressional composition. Source: Fidelity, FMRCo analysis of monthly data since 1789 (mix of S&P 500, Dow Jones Industrial Average, & Cowles Commission)

BlackRock notes that a steady hand may be the best way for investors to approach the choppy waters of a contested election.

“We prefer to look through any market volatility that a delayed result may bring and favor taking advantage of any selloffs in risk assets during this period of uncertainty to add to high-conviction positions,” reads a November 2 note from BlackRock Investment Institute.

Brian Cheung is a reporter covering the Fed, economics, and banking for Yahoo Finance. You can follow him on Twitter @bcheungz.

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