02 November 2016

For the Record: Clinton Victory Next Week

Just Friday I wrote that we could see a fall in dominoes that would give Trump's odds a serious bump. Those dominoes started with that day's announcement by FBI director Come(d)y that they were looking again at Clinton's emails and then extended into this week's events. The dominoes this week have not fallen which makes me confident that Clinton will be the president-elect a week from today.

What were those dominoes?

Friday's job report could have come in negative. The ADP report that comes out 2 days earlier, focusing on just private jobs, came in at 147,000 private sector jobs. There is a very high probability that Friday's jobs report will extend the positive numbers run to 73 months in row. That domino appears to have stayed upright.

The other event was today's announcement from the Federal Reserve. They could have raised rates but instead just signaled that they likely will raise rates in December. Even that caused markets to fall but not nearly as much as they would have had Yellen raised rates today.

So, no crashing stock market and negative jobs report to form the context for voters trip to the polls next week.

Nate Silver at fivethirtyeight likes to remind folks that the polls could be wrong and Clinton could lose states where she now leads. Putin's hackers or some aspiring journalist could reveal some nasty secret about the Clinton campaign that will tilt this close election to Trump. Something could change predictions but at least in terms of economic events, the last of the surprises are past.

If you are a Trump supporter, bang the table in frustration. If you are a Clinton supporter, exhale. In any case, it's now over.

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