The hand they're holding right now looks like uncertainty, confusion, lack of direction, mistrust and suspicion. Hardly a game a Wall Street trader would play. Wall Street's total fear of the unknown was readily evident Thursday when word leaked out that Al Gore's team in Florida was readying for a legal fight. Nervous traders quickly unloaded millions of shares. The Dow Jones industrial average, already on shaky ground, plunged close to 300 points, forcing trading curbs into effect.
Uncertainty reigns as traders ponder what to do next.
But there's been significant movement in certain sectors as investors identify the industries that will thrive under a George W. Bush or Al Gore administration. Vice President Gore has taken a strong stance against the pharmaceutical industry's pricing policies toward senior citizens. At the same time, the always worried financial services sector has felt some short-term losses because of the uncertainty and the prospects that if Bush is elected he will use the budget surplus to cut taxes rather than reduce the national debt. His take on the election is simply that the market has generally been doing well and will continue to do so. It doesn't matter to an enormous degree who's elected president.