US Presidential Betting Markets and the Taiwan Weighted Stock Index

With potential military conflict on the horizon between the United States and the People's Republic of China, the issue of Taiwan could be a deciding factor between peace and full-scale war. Historically, war has occurred due to the breakdown of economic and political systems nations rely on to ensure peace. In recent years there has been an accumulation of tension between the US and China on the economic and political fronts. The economic and political approach directed on both sides to the issue of Taiwan will have large repercussions on this conflict as a whole and whether it may be settled diplomatically. The chief of Naval operations recently established the goal of preparing the US Navy for potential conflict with the People's Republic of China by 2027 (Franchetti, 2024.) With this timeframe in mind, the potential conflict in Taiwan relates directly to one major factor in US politics: the 2024 presidential election. Of course, the 2024 election decided Trump would step into office from 2025-2029, with 2027 falling right in the middle of his administration's years. When running in 2024, Donald Trump and Kamala Harris had different approaches to the Taiwan conflict and international relations as a whole, the effects of which I evaluate using my regression model.
This paper covers key policy and rhetoric insights into 2024 US presidential candidates Donald Trump and Kamala Harris' approach toward China and Taiwan. I regress their likelihood of victory leading up to the election through political betting markets with the Taiwan weighted stock index to find correlations. Following what I learned from the regressions, I offer direct advisement to the public and to the United States government about which types of political and economic strategies benefit or harm Taiwan's security, which I hope could be used as a strategy to avoid armed conflict.