As we noted last week, the demand for election charts is off the charts (pun intended), so we are sharing some of our favorite election charts.
Without further ado, here are some more election charts you need to know as November 3 inches closer.
How stocks perform three months before the election has a stellar track record of predicting who will win in November. If stocks are higher, the incumbent party tends to win, while if stocks are lower, the incumbent party tends to lose. This indicator accurately predicted the winner 87% of the time (20 of 23) since the late 1920s.
Building on this, if President Donald Trump is going to win, right about now is when the S&P 500 Index should start to outperform. Of course, if it weakens, it could mean we will be looking at a President Joe Biden soon.
Speaking of presidents up for re-election, here’s what the S&P 500 historically has done during re-election years.
Lastly, here are two final charts that may help forecast the outcome.
If real per capita disposable income is higher, the incumbent president usually wins. Conversely, if wages are weak, that bodes well for someone new in the White House. Given real per capita disposable income is up more than 7% this year, it would suggest President Trump should take more than 70% of the votes. Of course, this is greatly skewed due to the CARES Act, so we’d put a major asterisk next to this one.
To sum up, Gallup poll approval ratings have done a nice job of predicting how many votes a president up for re-election might get. With a 42% Gallup approval rating currently, this comes out to 49% of the total votes for President Trump, which points to a close race.
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