Yahoo Finance ASX finishes flat as US Election continues
The ASX200 has finished flat, down 4.30 points to 6,062.10 points as the US election continues. The All Ordinaries also finished flat to 6,265 points.
Flight Centre and Webjet experienced some of the biggest gains, trading 5 per cent higher at the close of trade, while Fortescue Metals and Pendal Group experienced the lowest, down 4.63 per cent and 7.99 per cent respectively.
What happened this afternoon?
The ASX200 is trading down nearly 1 per cent at midday, to 6,007.10 points. It comes as the results from the first states are called in the race to 270 electoral votes.
So far, trump has taken South Carolina, West Virginia, Alabama, Mississippi, Oklahoma, Tennessee and Kentucky.
Meanwhile Joe Biden has taken Illinois, Maryland, New Jersey Delaware, Connecticut, Vermont and Massachusetts to add to Virginia.
The All Ordinaries is down 0.95 per cent to 6,203.00 points.
Nanosonics Limited is up 8.11 per cent at midday, with Graincorp, CSR Sandfire Resources and Flight Centre rounding out the top five largest gains on the ASX200.
Financial services companies Netwealth and Bank of Queensland are down more than 3 per cent, with Pendal Group down nearly 8 per cent. Fortescue Metals is trading 5.12 per cent lower.
What happened this morning?
Australian shares can’t make their mind up in early trade, as the nation wakes up mid-way through election polling in the United States.
The benchmark S&P ASX200 dropped slightly at the open, before bouncing back to 6,072.90 points at 10:20 AEDT. The broader All Ordinaries is 0.18 per cent higher to 6,274.10 points at 10:24 AEDT.
On Tuesday, the local bourse had its best day since 5 October, finishing up 1.93 per cent to 6,066.4 points. The index rose to a session high of 6.090.8 less than an hour after the Reserve Bank of Australia cut the official cash rate by 0.15 per cent to a record low of 0.10 per cent.
But the highs enjoyed on Tuesday may be short-lived, as today marks a historic day for the United States, and the world.
In the US, stocks closed higher in the lead up to Election Day, with investors hopeful a decision would be made without a prolonged process.
Current polls have Biden on track to secure the presidency, but the margin between the candidates is thinning.
"It seems as though the polls have narrowed which makes it a little bit more difficult for Biden but the market reacting the way it is now tells me the market thinks we are going to get a resolution fairly quickly," Randy Frederick Charles Schwab analyst told AAP.
"If for some reason we don't have any kind of a clear picture, if there is an unwillingness to concede on the part of the loser and this ends up having to go to the courts, we are in for some choppy, volatile markets for awhile."
The Dow Jones finished up more than 2 per cent to 27,480.03 points, while the S&P 500 finished 1.78 per cent higher to 3,369.02 and the Nasdaq closed 1.85 per cent higher to 11,160.57 points.
Stay up to date with US Election coverage here.
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