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U.S. Midterms Tuesday: What the Vote Could Mean for the Loonie, Tariffs and Your Portfolio

  Canadian Money Brief | Feature U.S. Midterms Tuesday: What the Vote Could Mean for the Loonie, Tariffs and Your Portfolio By MoneySavings.ca | Published November 1, 2026 Americans vote Tuesday in elections that will fill all 435 House seats and 35 Senate seats. Canadians don't get a ballot, but we do get the consequences: a loonie that swung from an 18-month low to a six-week high in about two weeks, a tariff fight that has put 50% duties on roughly US$20 billion of our exports, and a lot of U.S. stock sitting inside our TFSAs and RRSPs. Here is how to think about all of it without trying to guess the winner. The short version: Nobody can reliably trade an election result. Forecasters lean toward Democrats winning the House, with the Senate closer. But history says the bigger market moves tend to come in the months after the vote, not on election night. For Canadians, the useful steps are practical: convert U.S. dollars in pieces, know how much U.S. stock you hold, and don't...

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Wall Street Stumbles Toward Longest Weekly Losing Streak Since September


Wall Street is stumbling to close out its latest losing week. U.S. stocks fell after oil prices briefly surged overnight on worries about fighting in the Middle East. The S&P 500 was 0.7% lower in afternoon trading and on track for its third straight losing week. That would be its longest such streak since September, before it broke out into a record-setting romp. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 125 points, or 0.3%, as of 12:46 p.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was down 1.6%.

In the oil market, a barrel of Brent crude was back to $87.20, up 0.1%, after briefly leaping above $90 overnight. Iranian troops fired air defenses at a major air base and a nuclear site during an apparent Israeli drone attack, raising worries in the market. But crude prices pared their big gains as traders questioned how Iran would respond.

On Wall Street, Netflix sank 8.9% despite reporting stronger profits for the latest quarter than expected. Analysts called it a mostly solid performance, but the streaming giant disappointed some investors by saying it will stop giving updates on its subscriber numbers every three months, beginning next year. Procter & Gamble also weighed on the market after the consumer-products giant reported lower revenue for its latest quarter than analysts expected. Sales trends for its baby care products weakened following hikes to their prices and sank for its super-premium SK-II skincare brand, diluting gains made elsewhere. The company behind Pampers, Oral-B, and other brands reported stronger profit for its fiscal third quarter than analysts expected and raised its forecast for earnings in the fiscal year. But it did not raise its forecast for sales. Its stock slipped 0.4%.

Helping to limit the market’s losses was American Express, which rose 5.1%. It reported stronger profit for the latest quarter than analysts expected. Fifth Third Bancorp rose 6.1% after it likewise topped expectations.

The pressure is even higher than usual on companies to meet forecasts for their quarterly results. That’s because the other lever that helps set stock prices, interest rates, looks unlikely to offer much help in the near term. Top Fed officials said recently that they could hold interest rates at their high level for a while. That’s a letdown for traders after the Fed had signaled earlier that three cuts to interest rates could be possible this year. Lower rates would juice the economy and financial markets, and they earlier appeared to be on the horizon after inflation cooled sharply last year.


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