Italy election: hung parliament on cards as populists surge – as it happened

Here is Stephanie Kirchgaessner’s latest news round-up of the results.

With the counting and then horse trading likely to take some time, we’re going to wrap up our blog. Thanks for reading.

Better than expected results for Eurosceptic parties in Italy have been welcomed Britain’s anti European party Ukip.

The Economist Intelligence Unit has six key points from the result:

• The 2018 election produced an acutely fragmented parliament. The election’s big winner was the anti-establishment Five Star Movement which rode a wave of popular discontent linked economic malaise and concerns over immigration.

• No coalition or single formation won a majority, with the centre right taking about 37% of votes for the Chamber of Deputies, according to a projection by Quorum / YouTrend.

• M5S took about 32%, outperforming opinion polls owing largely to a dominant performance in the south. The populist, Eurosceptic Lega also won an impressive 18% of the vote, overtaking Forza Italia (FI) as the largest party in the centre-right coalition.

• A prolonged period of negotiations will follow over the coming weeks, with the president, Sergio Mattarella, to hold consultations with parties following the convening of the new parliament on 23 March.

• The key question is whether M5S will soften its policy against alliances with “established” parties, as Luigi Di Maio, the movement’s prime ministerial candidate has signaled he might in recent months.

• Equally important will be the stance of Matteo Salvini, the leader of the Lega. He must now choose between dominance of the centre right and a role as Mr Di Maio’s junior coalition partner, which could cause support for the Lega fall.

Europe Elects charts the dramatic slump in the vote for the centre-left Democratic Party headed by former PM Matteo Renzi. Its share fell from more than 40% in 2014 to just 19%. Many of its former supporters either didn’t vote or switched to the Five Star movement.

Former foreign minister, Emma Bonino, now leader of the More Europe party has won a Rome seat in the chamber of deputies, but nationally her party looks set to fall below the 3% threshold necessary for representation in the Senate.

Here are the latest projections in the 315-seat Senate and 630-seat Chamber of Deputies.

Interior minister Marco Minniti, from the centre-left Democratic Party, has lost his seat to the Five Star Movement.

5 Mar 201803.30 EST

Graeme Wearden

The Italian stock market has fallen in early trading as traders fret that Italy faces a period of political instability.

The benchmark FTSE MIB index tumbled by 2% at the open. It then stabilised around 1% lower, so there’s no sign of actual panic.
Unicredit, Italy’s largest bank, has shed 2.5% while UBI Banca are down 3.8%.

Rebecca O’Keeffe, Head of Investment at interactive investor, says the markets are nervous.

“Italy looks to have taken a step to the right and moved towards populism and change.

The complexity of the Italian voting system makes it very difficult to establish what happens next and when, but neither of the anti-establishment Five star movement or League parties are an attractive option for markets or the euro.”

Shares in Silvio Berlusconi’s Mediaset company have fallen by over 4% after his Forza Italia party did worse than expected in Sunday’s election, lagging behind the Northern League. Mediaset has been fighting a long legal battle with France’s Vivendi, and a strong showing by Forza Italia would have strengthened its hand.

See Business Live for more on the economic fallout from the election.

The Italian election results have prompted a fall on the euro. It hit a six-month low versus against the yen after stronger than expected results for results euro-sceptic parties, Reuters reports.

The euro zone’s third biggest economy now faces a prolonged period of political instability after voters delivered a hung parliament, spurning traditional parties and flocking to anti-establishment and far-right groups in record numbers.

The euro fell 0.3% and was traded at $1.2282, edging towards its seven-week low of $1.21545, which it touched on Thursday. Against the yen it fell to 129.35 yen, its lowest level since late August.

Although no party won a majority, the anti-establishment 5-Star Movement came out as a clear winner, looking set to become the largest single party by a wide margin.

The centre-right bloc, made up of former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi’s Forza Italia, and the far-right League and Brothers of Italy, is set to win most seats but is seen falling some way short of an absolute majority.

But in a bitter personal defeat for the billionaire media magnate, his Forza Italia party was overtaken by its ally, the far-right, anti-immigrant League.

Investors are likely to take fright at any suggestion the 5-Star could form a coalition with the right-wing League.

Initial tallies suggested the two forces would have enough seats to govern together and they have in the past shared strong anti-euro views. While the League still says it wants to leave the single currency at the earliest feasible moment, the 5-Star says the time for quitting the euro has passed.

“(The euro) gained in early Asian trade, perhaps due to the German vote, but then started turning down as the results from Italy began coming in. I’d expect it to weaken further today as the market absorbs the results of the Italian election,” said Marshall Gittler, chief strategist at ACLS Global.

This was an anti-establishment triumph on a par with Brexit and Trump, according to Bloomberg and Reppublica columnist Ferdinando Guigliano.

He shares his thoughts over a large moka.