Le Pen is NOT right-wing

If the mood on the financial markets today can be described by one word then it is a word “relief“. Relief bigger than what Šichtařová is experiencing when her plane finally touches the runway. The reason is simple: Emmanuel Macron is getting into the second round of the French presidential election.

What of course happened one time was that Šichtařová in the fear from the fact that there is a two-hour long flight ahead of her, completely intentionally and in control, consummated half of litre of scotch bottom up style, got on the plane, fell asleep, woke up and found out that the plane is on the land so she experienced a flow of relief – just so she would find out right away that unplanned layover happened because of the strong counter-wind and she has to go through all of that again. In other words: we still have the second round ahead of us and until that is going to be behind us all judgments are somewhat premature. Despite that, all the polls are hinting that the final victory of Macron over Le Pen is almost certain. And that should secure the financial markets definitive boost.

Besides, the markets got boost already after this first round: Somewhat peculiar it is especially because the markets are usually not reacting as well to the victory of the left-wing candidate. And – let’s admit it – even though Macron is being labelled as centre-left, he is significantly closer to the left than to the centre. Why is that?

The reason is that the labels got a little bit tangled in the case of French election and labelling Le Pen as right-wing is almost ridiculously unthinkable. Le Pen is significantly anti-immigration and anti-integration but not right-wing. Judge it yourself: Raising salary of government employees by 200 euros, lowering the retirement age to 60 years, raising the pension, administrative regulation and lowering the prices of gas and electricity by 5 percent, lowering excise taxes even by 20 % but raising the progression and percentage of the income tax, taxation of luxurious goods, raising the property tax, progression of business taxation… that is literally a clear ultra-left program.

The joy of the financial markets over Macron can’t be understood as much as the valuing of the candidate but rather as their joy that Le Pen is being faced by somebody who has a high chance of winning against her but at the same time he is not a communist and in any case obviously extreme either. And if the second round ends up like everybody is thinking that it is going to end up, the joy on the financial market is going to be even bigger .