I refer to the news that Joe Biden has given in to the inevitable, which was not really sacrificing very much, given that in my opinion there was never any chance of him getting re-elected. If he really thought he could win, then it is indeed as well that he stood down!
The ‘anointing’ of his deputy Kamala Harris as the candidate, should that happen, is not likely to change many voter intentions at this stage, apart from those with limited thinking capacity, because a vote for Biden was always a vote for Harris anyway. I say that because I think that intelligent voters would have assessed the possibility of Biden dying or becoming incapable of fulfilling his duties properly over a full 4 years as quite high. That would have then put Harris in charge.
We don’t currently know if there will be any other candidates for the Democratic nomination. Someone emerging who is really charismatic and capable of challenging Trump may only be a pipe-dream for the ‘anyone but Trump’ crowd.
I personally think that the possibility of having a black woman as US president will appeal to a chunk of the electorate, but not many of those would have otherwise voted for Trump, so I can’t see a huge blocks of votes moving to the Democrats.
In terms of economics and markets. in the short term something unsatisfactory has been fixed (a lame duck Democrat nominee) but I would expect markets to be factoring in another Trump presidency nonetheless. It matters very little – the near term direction of interest rates is much more important.
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