US election 2020: Donald Trump or Joe Biden, here's who is betting markets favourite

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Even as the early trends from US Presidential election seem to favour Democrat candidate Joe Biden over incumbent Republican President Donald Trump, betting markets are still favoring Trump to emerge victorious.

According to New Zealand-based predictions market PredictIt, Trump is leading over Biden at 62 cents-to-37 cents, from being 61 cents-to-44 centres in favour of the former US vice president.

Interestingly, the website of PredictIt faced an outage as soon as the counting started with the predictions market posting on Twitter that it was working to "bring service back as soon as possible." PredictIt did not reveal why the website faced the outage, reported Reuters.

Meanwhile, bettors on Betfair are giving a 75% chance to Trump to making it again to the White House. It was only 39% when polls started in the US on Tuesday morning. The odds of a win for Biden on Betfair fell to 25% from 61% earlier.

As of 10.30 am (IST), Democratic candidate Biden was leading with over 200 electoral votes in a race in which a candidate needs 270 votes to win the US presidency. Trump had secured 118 electoral votes.

"Trump has overtaken Biden significantly and is now in pole position, suggesting it could be a very nervous night ahead for Biden," Betfair spokesperson Sam Rosbottom said.

According to Britain-based Smarkets exchange, Trump has 55% chances of winning the election, up from 39% when polls opened. Bets on Trump jumped to as much as 80% at 2300 Eastern Time (0300 GMT), before dropping back.

Odds for Biden on Smarkets have fallen to 45% from 61% earlier.

Meanwhile, security at the White House, government buildings and major commercial avenues across the US has been tightened, with retailers boarding up their stores to head off any damages as America braced for possible unrest and violence in a bitter and divisive US presidential election 2020.