US stocks jump after FBI lifts cloud over Clinton

US stock futures jumped after the FBI reaffirmed Sunday its decision to not prosecute Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton over her use of private email while secretary of state.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation announced a review of newly discovered emails had provided no reason to alter its July decision that Clinton and her aides’ use of the private server for official documents, while “reckless,” did not warrant criminal charges.
The lifting of an FBI threat that Clinton might face charges — less than two days before her face-off with Republican Donald Trump — raised investor sentiment on Wall Street.
Ahead of Monday’s market opening, futures on the broad-market S&P 500 index leaped 1.4 percent to 2,108.25. Futures based on the 30-stock Dow Jones Industrial Average were up 1.1 percent at 17,999.

Trump cries foul as FBI clears Clinton

Donald Trump has accused the FBI of impropriety after it once again exonerated his rival Hillary Clinton of criminal conduct on her emails.
The FBI director said a fresh inquiry into the Democratic candidate’s communications found nothing to change the bureau’s conclusion this summer.
The Clinton campaign said it was “glad” the lingering issue had been resolved.
The dramatic twist lifted a cloud from her campaign as the final day of the marathon US election race loomed.
The latest opinion polls on Sunday, before news broke of the FBI announcement, gave Mrs Clinton a four to five-point lead over Trump.
The Republican nominee cried foul after learning about the law enforcement bureau’s decision.
At a rally in the Detroit suburbs, Trump insisted it would have been impossible for the FBI to review what has been reported to be as many as 650,000 emails in such a short time.
“Right now she’s being protected by a rigged system. It’s a totally rigged system. I’ve been saying it for a long time,” he told supporters in Sterling Heights, Michigan.

Earthquake shakes major US oil city

A sharp earthquake centred near one of the world’s key oil hubs Sunday night triggered fears that the magnitude 5.0 tremor might have damaged key infrastructure in addition to causing what police described as “quite a bit of damage” in the Oklahoma prairie town of Cushing.
The Oklahoma Corporation Commission said it and the Oklahoma Geological Survey were investigating after the quake, which struck at 7:44 p.m. and was felt as far away as Iowa, Illinois and Texas.
“The OCC’s Pipeline Safety Department has been in contact with pipeline operators in the Cushing oil storage terminal under state jurisdiction and there have been no immediate reports of any problems,” the commission’s spokesman, Matt Skinner, said in a statement. “The assessment of the infrastructure continues.”
The oil storage terminal is one of the world’s largest.
The Cushing Police Department reported “quite a bit of damage” from the earthquake but details were not immediately available. Photos posted to social media show piles of debris at the base of commercial buildings in the city.

Obama unlikely to see assault on Islamic State’s Syria stronghold

A U.S.-backed assault on Raqqa, Islamic State’s de facto capital in Syria, is unlikely to pierce the city itself before President Barack Obama leaves office in January, denying him the chance to claim the end of the group’s “caliphate” as part of his legacy.
Although a U.S.-backed alliance of Syrian armed groups announced the kickoff of the offensive on Sunday, U.S. officials caution the fighters will first try to seal off and isolate the Islamic State stronghold, a process that could take two months or longer.
As a result, the victor of Tuesday’s U.S. presidential election almost certainly will inherit the job of routing the militants from the city from which they have run their shrinking territories in Syria and Iraq, overseen branches from West Africa to South Asia and plotted attacks in Western Europe and elsewhere.
“There is no available force capable of taking Raqqa in the near future,” said one U.S. official. Another said some of the needed Arab forces were still in training. Like seven other officials interviewed for this report, they requested anonymity to discuss the issue.
U.S. Marine General Joseph Dunford, the top U.S. military officer, played down the idea that

Moroccan king reaches out to African leaders in Senegal

Moroccan King Mohammed VI offered a conditional olive branch to African leaders Sunday in a speech in Senegal declaring his country wanted to “take back its natural position in Africa”.
Morocco is seeking to rejoin the African Union, 32 years after quitting the bloc in protest at its decision to accept Western Sahara as a member.
In a gesture of African solidarity, Mohammed VI delivered an annual speech usually given at home in Dakar to “show the great interest we take in our continent”, while still firmly maintaining the “unshakeable Moroccan identity of the Western Sahara”.
Morocco has occupied the sparsely populated Western Sahara area since 1975 in a move that was not recognised by the international community.
Mohammed VI emphasised his nation would “ask no one’s permission to take our legitimate

Asian markets rally on FBI Clinton announcement

Asian equities staged a rebound and the Mexican peso rallied Monday as traders breathed a sigh of relief after the head of the FBI said market-favourite Hillary Clinton would not face charges over her use of a private email server.
Investors were sent into a funk last week after James Comey said messages linked to the Democratic presidential nominee were being looked at, sending rival Donald Trump surging in opinion polls just days before the November 8 vote.
The former Secretary of State is considered by most investors to be a safer, more stable bet than Trump, who is seen as a loose cannon, with policies many fear could wreck the world’s top economy.
However, on Sunday Comey announced he would not change his July recommendation that Clinton not be prosecuted for putting US secrets at risk.
“Markets are likely to remove some of the risk premium taken as a precaution against a Trump victory now that Hillary Clinton will not be charged over her use of a private email server,” said CMC Markets chief analyst Ric Spooner.
“However, an element of uncertainty remains over this election. It seems unlikely that markets will make a full ‘risk on’ move until Clinton is declared the winner.”
Tokyo’s Nikkei ended the morning session 1.4 percent higher while Hong Kong was up 0.3

Trump and Clinton fight to the finish in bitter US vote

White House rivals Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump were still flailing for a knockout blow Monday as a presidential race that has cast a pall over US democracy neared its end.
With one day of campaigning left, both sides had packed schedules in the swing states that will decide whether the Democrat can convert her slim opinion poll lead into final victory.
Trump, a populist tycoon who co-opted the Republican Party and created a raucous, nativist grassroots movement in his own image, was still campaigning at midnight Sunday.
Branding 69-year-old Clinton the “most corrupt candidate ever to seek the office of the presidency,” he urged supporters to “deliver justice at the ballot box on November 8.”
Clinton, the former secretary of state running to become America’s first female president, had events planned through midnight Monday to take her into polling day itself.
The Democrat spent the last eight days of campaigning under a renewed FBI inquiry into whether she had exposed US secrets by using a private email server at the State Department.
That burden was finally lifted on Sunday, when the FBI confirmed it would not seek criminal charges, but at the cost of another cycle of headlines about an issue that has hurt her.
She tried to end Sunday’s round of rallies on a note of optimism about the United States, albeit couched as a warning that her supporters need to rise to counter the Trump threat.
“I really want each and every one of us to think for a moment about how we would feel on November 9, if we were not successful,” she said in Manchester, New Hampshire
“When your kids and grandkids ask you what you did in 2016, when everything was on the line, I hope you’ll be able to say you voted for a better, stronger, fairer America.”
The world has looked on agog during the campaign, as Trump’s once mocked reality television shtick became a plausible vehicle for victory in a divided and suspicious country.
World markets were rocked last month when the renewed FBI probe threated to sink Clinton’s chances, and Asian exchanges opened higher after that threat was lifted.
But Trump came back fighting, and experts said the renewed scandal had already damaged the Democratic former first lady’s chance of succeeding President Barack Obama.
Clinton’s lead dropped from 5.7 to 2.9 percentage points in the week since the scandal returned, according to influential data journalist Nate Silver of FiveThirtyEight.com.
Trump is predicting a ballot upset on a par with Britain’s shock vote this year to quit the European Union, or what on Sunday he called: “Brexit plus, plus, plus.”
Clinton has booked a star-studded roster of supporters — headlined by President Barack Obama and rock star Bruce Springsteen — for her final events on Monday.
But Trump is also touring key swing states and was determined not to let Clinton off the hook over her email, a symbol for his supporters of the corruption of the Washington elite.
– ‘Rigged system’ –
“The rank and file special agents of the FBI won’t let her get away with her terrible crimes,” Trump told a rally in Michigan, a state won comfortably by Obama in 2012.
“Right now she’s being protected by a rigged system. It’s a totally rigged system. I’ve been saying it for a long time,” he declared, as his supporters chanted “Lock her up!”
Late last month, with Clinton seemingly on a glide path to victory, a renewed FBI investigation in Clinton’s email use sent shock waves through both campaigns.
Trump, the 70-year-old property tycoon and Republican flag-bearer, seized on the opening, condemning Clinton’s “criminal scheme” and arguing that she is unfit to be president.
He has previously threatened to reject the result of Tuesday’s vote if he loses, alleging that the race has been “rigged” by the media and the establishment elite.
Opinion polls tightened as Trump began to recover ground he lost after several women accused him of sexual assault, and the race looked headed for a photo finish.
Clinton made no direct reference to her reprieve during her Sunday campaign stops.
Instead, she hammered her opponent over his sometimes ugly rhetoric and, implicitly, the alleged covert Russian interference that have poisoned the race.
“There are powerful forces inside and outside of America that do threaten to pull us apart,” she said.
“We’ve arrived at a moment of reckoning in this election. Our core values as Americans are being tested.”
If Clinton wins, she will seek to build on Obama’s cautious but progressive legacy, including his controversial health insurance reforms.
Trump has vowed to tear up the reform along with free trade agreements, to rebuild a “depleted” US military and review US alliances.
The latest polls give Clinton a narrow national lead of between three and five percentage points, but rolling averages point to a closer race, with Trump up in some swing states.
Silver has Clinton as a two-to-one favorite against Trump, but warned Sunday that her lead appears “less solid” than Obama’s did before his re-election victory in 2012.