Stock market futures plunge with election uncertainty, tight vote count

The Dow Jones Industrial cratered nearly 700 points in futures trading Tuesday night as traders reacted to the very tight electoral race where Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump has taken a surprising lead.

In addition, the future projections for the Standard and Poor’s 500-stock index dropped 88 points, while the Nasdaq futures dropped nearly 200.

More from the Washington Post:

The uncertainty over the outcome of one of the most contentious presidential elections in modern history rattled investors around the world. Japan’s Nikkei index plunged 382 points, or more than 2 percent, while Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index lost 846 points, or 3.6 percent. Meanwhile, the Mexican peso — which has fallen when the Republican nominee rose in the polls during his campaign — nosedived to an eight-year low, according to Bloomberg.

“It’s all a little bit crazy now,” said Chris Weston, chief markets strategist at IG Markets in Melbourne. “Pollsters need to go away and have a holiday – every single one of them should be fired. Markets weren’t prepared for this.”

Markets in the U.S. surged over the past two days as Democrat Hillary Clinton began to widen her lead over Trump in the polls. But a Trump win provides a lot of uncertainty for the markets, according to traders, given that he has advocated to withdraw from longstanding trade deals, such as NAFTA.