A data expert believes US President Donald Trump will win a second term and beat Democratic nominee Joe Biden in November's election.
Professor Bela Stantic, who founded and directs the Big Data and Smart Analytics Lab and Queensland's Griffith University, said on Sunday his initial analyst showed Trump was "tracking really well".
News.com.au reports that Prof Stantic has a strong record of predicting the outcome of elections - successfully picking the results of last year's Australia federal election, the UK's Brexit referendum in 2016, and he also forecasted Trump would win the 2016 US election.
Prof Stantic anticipates behaviour from voters by analysing sentiment and data from social media.
Earlier this month, four polls showed Biden had a significant lead over Trump, but opinion polls before the last US election showed then-Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton also had a double-digit lead over Trump.
"It is maybe early, but I can tell you that the trend we identified in advance last time is holding," Prof Stantic told news.com.au.
"It's really a coin toss. I think Florida, at the moment, is a coin toss, but Trump is just ahead."
Prof Stantic assumes Trump won't win the popular vote, which was also won by Clinton in 2016.
"However, he's tracking really well in the crucial states," he told the news website.
"Florida is a coin toss, but he's slightly ahead for me. And Minnesota and Pennsylvania as well.
"And then Texas, he will win easily."
Some experts believe the election result will be decided by how the economy is tracking, as well as other impacts of COVID-19.
"This election's going to be decided by the economy and by what's going on in the streets of America," said Allan Lichtman, the MIT Election Data and Science Lab founding director.
"The pandemic itself may well turn two other keys. So while the pandemic itself isn't a key, through the trigger effect, it might figure in a very major way in the final prediction," Lichtman told the ABC.
Trump secured the Presidency in the 2016 election by winning major states Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Florida by small margins.
