Greece's Syriza on cusp of winning outright majority: exit poll

Reuters
U.S. stock futures were steady Monday, recovering from earlier losses as investors looked past Syriza's victory in Greece's election. WSJ's Kristen Scholer reports. Photo: Getty

ATHENS (Reuters) - Greece's anti-austerity leftist party Syriza stood on the cusp of an outright victory in Sunday's snap election, commanding a 10 point lead over Prime Minister Antonis Samaras' conservatives, an updated exit poll showed. Syriza was on track to take 36 and 38 percent of the national vote, well ahead of Samaras' center-right New Democracy party which was seen taking 26 to 28 percent, according to the updated poll by Metron Analysis, GPO, Alco, MRB, Marc. The updated poll showed Syriza securing between 148 to 154 seats in the 300-seat parliament. An absolute majority for Syriza will depend in large part on whether former Prime Minister George Papandreou's new center-left party manages to cross the 3 percent threshold to enter parliament. The updated poll indicated that seven or eight parties will make it into parliament, with Papandreou's party securing between 2.2 and 3.2 percent of the vote. The prospect of a Syriza victory has worried financial markets who fear the party's plan to demand a debt writeoff and end austerity measures will trigger a new financial crisis and put Greece on the path to a euro exit. Centrists To Potami and far-right Golden Dawn were tied for third spot with 6 to 7 percent of the vote, according to the exit poll. (Reporting by Renee Maltezou and Lefteris Karagiannopoulos, Writing by Deepa Babington)