The Australian share market and dollar have been beneficiaries of Emmanuel Macron's victory in the first round of the French presidential election, as the centrist looks increasingly likely to win the run-off.
Mr Macron won the first round of voting with approximately 24 per cent of votes cast, while the leader of the anti-immigration and anti-European Union National Front Marine Le Pen came second with around 22 per cent.
In a close contest, conservative Francois Fillon and the left-wing Jean-Luc Melenchon both had around a fifth of the vote each.
With most of their voters expected to back Mr Macron over Ms Le Pen, polling and analysts suggest he should score a comfortable 60-40 victory in the second round run-off in a fortnight.
The result pleased markets, where the biggest fear had been the real and growing prospect of a run-off vote between the far-right's Le Pen and the far-left's Melenchon.
The biggest initial beneficiary of the outcome was the euro, which jumped around 2 US cents to $US1.09 this morning on the improved prospects for its long-term survival.
The Australian dollar, seen as a "risk" asset and generally sought after in periods of global optimism, also rose against the greenback to 75.52 US cents, but eased against the surging euro.
"Given that pre-vote polling shows that Macron should trounce Le Pen on May 7, markets are already celebrating as though Macron is already the president of The Republic," said Greg McKenna, the chief market strategist at AxiTrader.
"That's all well and good in this initial period of low-volume very early Asian trade. But the big question is whether traders will fade the euro strength."
Asia-Pacific shares generally gain on French vote
It was not just currencies that were moved by the French vote, with regional share markets also generally making up ground.
The Nikkei was the best performer, boosted not just by the general optimism about Europe's prospects but also by a steep fall in the yen. It was up 1.4 per cent by 12:30pm (AEST).
Other regional markets did not share the currency-related boost and had more modest gains.
Hong Kong's Hang Seng was up just 0.2 per cent, while China's main Shanghai index was actually off 1.2 per cent.
Australia's benchmark ASX 200 index was up 0.2 per cent to 5,866, with banks and retailers leading, while most mining stocks fell.
Gold miner Newcrest was down 1.2 per cent to $23.30 as the precious metal slipped to $US1,274 an ounce due to investors seeing less need for a safe haven.
Energy producers benefitted from an increase in crude oil prices, with Woodside up 0.5 per cent.
The major banks were also beneficiaries of the risk-on mood, posting gains of between 0.2 and 0.7 per cent.
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