Finance & economics | Buttonwood

Why investors are unwise to bet on elections

Turning a profit from political news is a lot harder than it looks

illustration of a voting box with teeth at the opening, giving it a menacing look. A hand holding a stack of notes appears to be placing them inside the box
Illustration: Satoshi Kambayashi

To meet the world’s biggest news junkies, head not to Washington or Westminster. Instead, make your way to a trading floor, where information from every corner of the globe must be parsed the instant it emerges. Whatever the news, from coups to company-earnings reports, it probably affects the price of something. This year, amid a seemingly never-ending series of elections, the addicts are not short of a fix. Electorates representing most of the world’s population are heading to polling booths, and not just market-makers but investors everywhere face the tantalising prospect of trading on the results.

Explore more

This article appeared in the Finance & economics section of the print edition under the headline “Democratic deficit”

From the July 27th 2024 edition

Discover stories from this section and more in the list of contents

Explore the edition

More from Finance & economics

Solar panels installed on the roof of a building at Skardu in Pakistan's Gilgit-Baltistan region.

Cheap solar power is sending electrical grids into a death spiral

Pakistan and South Africa provide a warning for other countries

People walk at Zaryadye park with the Kremlin and St. Basil's Cathedral in the background in Moscow, Russia.

Russian inflation is too high. Does that matter?

In a strong economy, price pressure can endure for a long time


illustration of a house cut in half diagonally, the lower corner being a bill.

Why you should repay your mortgage early

For the first time in decades, the arithmetic suggests settling housing loans


How AI will divide the best from the rest

Optimists hope the technology will be a great equaliser. Instead, it looks likely to widen social divides

The danger of relying on OpenAI’s Deep Research

Economists are in raptures, but they should be careful

Elon Musk is failing to cut American spending

DOGE has so far disrupted everything in government bar the deficit