Even an attempted assassination of a presidential candidate couldn’t knock U.S. stocks from record levels. As of midday Monday, two days after a gunman wounded former President Donald Trump at a campaign rally in Pennsylvania, the Dow Jones Industrial Average and the S&P 500 had hit new highs, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq was also up.
The disconnect between sentiments on Wall Street and around Americans’ kitchen tables has been a long-running theme since the pandemic, and both campaigns are looking to tap into it. “The market is really focusing on earnings, AI, inflation and interest rates, all of which seem to be going in our favor,” Stovall said of Wall Street investors. “That is why the market has pretty much ignored what happened.” Investors are also potentially bullish about the prospects of a Trump victory.