Yahoo Finance Asian Markets Gain as Investors Await U.S. Midterm Election Results
Investing.com - Asian markets traded mostly higher in morning trade on Wednesday as investors awaited the results of U.S. midterm elections.
As of 09:15 PM ET (01:15 GMT), Republicans won 59 House seats compared with 53 for the Democrats, who need a net gain of 23 seats to win the House.
The Democrats flipped two Republican seats in Virginia and Florida, but lost a congressional race in Kentucky.
The final polls will close at midnight eastern time.
Many analysts previously expected a split Congress to be the likely outcome.
While many fear a split Congress could lead to political gridlock in Washington, stifling President Donald Trump's ability to further implement expansive fiscal policy measures, some on Wall Street reminded investors that markets generally do well in those times.
"Markets generally do well under gridlock," said Bank of America Merrill Lynch (NYSE:BAC). "A modest infrastructure bill might see bipartisan support, which could lift industrials and materials."
In Asia, China’s Shanghai Composite and the SZSE Component inched up 0.1% and 0.5% respectively. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index gained 0.7%.
Chinese Vice President Wang Qishan said on Tuesday that Beijing is open to discussion with the U.S. to seek solutions to the trade war with the U.S. Wang, however, noted that China would not be “bullied and oppressed by imperialist powers.”
Separately, the People’s Bank of China’s Governor Yi Gang said in an interview with the Economic Daily, a government affiliated newspaper, that the central bank will be expanding the bond financing tool it announced last month.
Elsewhere, Japan’s Nikkei advanced 1.0% after dipping briefly into negative territory earlier in the morning.
South Korea’s KOSPI inched up 0.2%.
Down under, Australia’s ASX 200 was up 0.1%.
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