After the first three primary contests, democratic presidential frontrunner Joe Biden became the former frontrunner with many politicos on both the left and right predicting that his campaign was over after Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) surged ahead in the delegate count and the polls. But now the former vice president is back on top in both momentum and the delegate race after a strong showing on Super Tuesday, where he won 9 of the 15 states. With the democratic socialist, pro-“Medicare-for-All” Sanders’ chances of winning a majority of delegates plummeting, the stock market, particularly health care stocks, surged on Wednesday.
“Stocks surged on Wednesday as major victories from former Vice President Joe Biden during Super Tuesday sparked a massive rally within the health care sector,” CNBC reported Wednesday. “The Dow Jones Industrial Average traded 615 points higher, or 2.4%. The S&P 500 jumped 1.9% along with the Nasdaq Composite. … The Health Care Select Sector SPDR ETF (XLV) traded more than 3% higher. UnitedHealth and Centene jumped more than 10% each.”
The main reason, as one investment strategist cited by CNBC put it, is increased optimism that Sanders is now less likely to spread “the virus of socialism.”
“Investors fear Bernie because he wants to cut off the head of capitalism by raising taxes significantly on the rich and using the funds to provide free everything to everybody else,” said Yardeni Research’s Ed Yardeni. “Getting everything for free trumps freedom, according to Bernie. No wonder investors are reacting to him as though he is going to infect us all with the virus of socialism.”
If progressive Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) drops out, Ritholtz Wealth Management CEO Josh Brown predicts, stocks will enjoy even more positive movement. “Stocks will be even more relieved at Warren’s coming concession as they are at Biden’s big showing,” Brown tweeted, as CNBC notes. “Wall Streeters have always secretly been more afraid of her than anyone else given her domain expertise.”
Biden now leads the Democratic primary race in total delegates. With most of the results in from Super Tuesday, Biden currently leads with 467 delegates. Sanders is second with 392 and Warren is a distant third with 51. Bloomberg is fourth with 45, while Tulsi Gabbard has just 1 delegate.
Before Biden’s significant victory in South Carolina, Sanders had both the lead in the delegate count and leads in many key polls, including in some of the states Biden went on to win Tuesday. But after burying Sanders in South Carolina, pulling in 39 of the 54 total delegates (Sanders grabbing the remaining 15), national momentum swung toward Biden.
By the end of the night, Biden won 9 of the 15 states: Alabama, Arkansas, Massachusetts, Minnesota, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas and Virginia. As of now, Biden has amassed 467 delegates thus far. Sanders won four of the remaining five states, including the one with the most sizable delegate haul, California. The Vermont senator also won Colorado, Vermont and Utah. Sanders’ current delegate count is 392. In third is Warren, with just 51 delegates.