Excerpt from Barrons article featuring Horizon Investments’ Greg Valliere

It sounds silly at first. But, at second blush, it sure seems like biotechnology stocks and exchange-traded funds are rallying in part because Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton is battling pneumonia.

On Monday, shares of Illumina (ILMN), Regeneron (REGN) and Amgen (AMGN) all are top gainers in the S&P 500. Strategists who follow inside-the-Beltway happenings and Wall Street are talking about what happens should Clinton be forced out of the race for health reasons. This is all speculation, of course, but punters need odds like fish need water. Here’s Greg Valliere, chief global strategist at Horizon Investments:

“THE PRESIDENTIAL RACE HAS BEEN DRAMATICALLY ALTERED, with two issues now swirling around Hillary Clinton: First, does she really just have pneumonia, or something worse, perhaps tied to her history of blood clots?

Second, the trust issue is relevant, big time, because her campaign hid the apparent pneumonia diagnosis on Friday — even, for several hours, after she nearly collapsed yesterday.

The Clintons seemingly loathe transparency, and that’s a clear take-away from this episode.”