Global stocks rallied with commodities and Mexico's peso on speculation Hillary Clinton's chances of a U.S. election win increased after the FBI said her handling of emails wasn't a crime. Demand for havens waned, with higher-rated bonds, the yen and gold retreating.
The MSCI All Country World Index rose the most in six weeks, the S&P 500 Index halted its longest slide since 1980 and European shares climbed from a four-month low as Ms. Clinton is seen by investors as the more predictable candidate. The peso posted the biggest jump in a month, and a rally in the dollar versus the yen showed traders were close to fully pricing in a Democrat win. Oil and metals paced gains in materials, while gold sank with Treasuries.
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Financial markets have been on edge, with gauges of volatility soaring, since
FBI director James Comey's announcement on Oct. 28 that the bureau was looking into more Ms. Clinton emails from an unauthorized server. All the jitters with election polls showing a tighter presidential race spurred a search for relatively safer assets last week. That came to a halt just before the Nov. 8 vote as Mr. Comey said Sunday in a letter to Congress his agency maintained its July conclusion that it wouldn't recommend criminal charges against Ms. Clinton.
“There's a restrained global relief,” said Piet Lammens, head of research at KBC Bank NV in Brussels. “The market reacted to the message that they started the investigation and now they have to do the opposite. However, we are just one day before the election and it would be imprudent to take big positions and think everything is OK.”
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Ms. Clinton is leading Republican rival Donald Trump by three percentage points among likely voters nationally, the latest sign that her campaign's painstaking focus on women, Latinos and blacks could help propel her to the White House. The final Bloomberg Politics national poll before Tuesday's election has Ms. Clinton ahead of Mr. Trump, 44 % to 41 %, when third-party candidates are included. In a two-way contest, she's also up by three points.
STOCKS
MSCI's global gauge climbed 1.2 % at 10:02 a.m. in New York, the most since Sept. 22.
The S&P 500 rallied 1.4 % to 2,114.85, following a nine-day slide that erased $725 billion in value from U.S. equities.
“We've been down nine straight days as concerns over a potential Trump victory put a lot of caution in the market,” said Michael James, managing director of equity trading at Wedbush Securities Inc. in Los Angeles. “Some of that is being relieved with the comments from the FBI about the Clinton email investigations. All today guarantees is that there will be more volatility for the rest of the week following tomorrow's election.”
The Stoxx Europe 600 Index jumped 1.3% after capping its 11th consecutive day without gains for the first time since 1994. HSBC Holdings Plc climbed on a surprise jump in adjusted profit. Glencore Plc and Rio Tinto Group paced gains among miners as commodities from oil to steel advanced. PostNL NV rallied after Belgian mail service Bpost SA revived its approach to its Dutch counterpart.
The MSCI Emerging Markets Index rose 1.6%, its first increase in five days. Brazil's Ibovespa led gains among the world's biggest stock markets. Hungarian shares reached a record high after the country was returned to investment grade by Moody's Investors Service. Egypt's EGX 30 extended an eight-day rally amid bets a decision to float the nation's currency will help cement a $12 billion loan from the International Monetary Fund.
