US markets on edge for more election surprises

Bombshells notwithstanding, US stock markets still see a victory by Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump as the less likely outcome of the November 8 vote, analysts say. MIT economics professor Simon Johnson, former chief economist of the International Monetary Fund, says the reaction could be brutal, given the fragile state of the US and global economic recoveries. "A big adverse surprise -- like the election of Donald Trump in the US -- would cause the stock market to crash and plunge the world into recession," Johnson said in a column published Monday.