Markets rise, US faces split Congress and surging COVID-19

Markets rose on Thursday.

The S&P 500 surged 1.9 percent, the STOXX Europe 600 rose 1.1 percent and the Nikkei 225 jumped 1.7 percent.

“It looks likely that we’ll see a split Congress, which, based on history, has been the preference of the stock market,” said Lindsey Bell, chief investment strategist at Ally Invest, as the US election vote-counting dragged on on Thursday.

Also on Thursday, the Federal Reserve left monetary policy unchanged.

“We’ve gotten through the first five, six months of the expansion better than expected,” said Fed Chair Jerome Powell at a news conference after the two-day policy meeting. “But we have to be humble where we are relative to this disease. It has not gone away.”

Indeed, the US reported a record 114,876 new COVID-19 cases on Thursday. Hospitalisations for COVID-19 reached all-time highs in 16 states on Wednesday.