Vietnam mulls doubling coal export quota to reduce stockpile

Crude oil futures took a sharp hit in intraday trading in Asia on Wednesday, amid a tight US election where Republican Donald Trump was showing a significant lead ahead of Democrat Hillary Clinton for the race to the White House.

At 1:46 pm Singapore time (0546 GMT), January ICE Brent crude futures plunged $1.04/b (2.26%) from Tuesday's settle to $45/b, while NYMEX December light sweet crude futures fell $1.18/b (2.62%) to $43.80/b.

The latest results show Trump with a 244-215 lead in Electoral College votes at 0546 GMT, leaving Clinton with few options to reach the 270 needed to clinch the US presidency.

Results in Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin remained too close to call, but Trump had a lead in all three states.

The figures sent financial indices plunging across the board.

The US dollar index slumped 1.87% from Tuesday's close to 95.115 as of 0546 GMT Wednesday.

Asian equities were deep in the red, with the Nikkei plunging 4.06%, the Hang Seng Index down 2.82% and the Shanghai Composite Index edging lower by 1.32%

Analysts said a Clinton presidency would have represented stability and policy continuity, while a Trump win engendered widespread uncertainty in financial markets.

"The uncertainty arising from Trump's policy platform, where consistency is secondary to populist appeal, is likely to reduce market confidence on US growth initially, and possibly upend global trade in the longer-term," said Mizuho Bank analyst Chang Wei Liang.