MONTHLY BAROMETER

Interest rates and inflation look set to be higher for longer, ditto for public debt levels. China’s flailing economy and the global economic and geopolitical fallout. Expansion of BRICS bloc membership changes nothing and everything. Beware 'risk blindness’, faltering climate policies and bubbling AI [...]

A resilient global economy but not to the same extent everywhere. Beware of ‘junk’ crawling out from under the low interest rate woodwork - almost everywhere. Not everyone feels threatened by AI but enough do to make it matter. Extreme heat events will impact everything. The worsening climate crisis engenders climate fatigue, powering political polarisation. Putin will stop at [...]

Global recession is almost a given, but there is mixed-messaging as to its severity. Security concerns and suspicion are pervasive - policymakers decide, business must adapt. How much has the Wagner attempted coup weakened Putin? Conserving natural capital is not an option, it's a necessity for economic growth. The same is true for the deployment of generative AI and [...]

Global economic outlook is fragile, characterised by deceleration, rising debt and bad demographics. Tech has some of the answers, but not without policy challenges. Similar distributional issues beset climate policy. The urgent need for AI and social media to come under regulatory scrutiny. All important détente is not in sight [...]

The economic outlook is murky - creating confusion. Inflation is lower but hasn’t gone away - impacting sentiments. Fragmentation is looking likely - causing nervousness. China-US relations - today’s defining issue. US default, will it won’t it? Political fallout from green agenda turbulence. Are demographic’s enough to make it India’s century? Civil conflicts on the rise globally. So is [...]

The slow-rolling macro crisis. Central banks’ conundrum with rising interest rates that hurt. IPCC latest report: we’ve been warned. Xi’s vassal, Vladimir and his long-lasting war. US-China - decoupling is no longer unimaginable. What AI can do for productivity [...]

The global economy is doing better (for the moment), but inflation remains sticky. The ever-lasting war that Putin cannot win but won’t give up, risks major escalation if China gets involved. A world of three non-cooperative blocs is becoming the geopolitical reality. The market vagaries of fighting climate change. Tech innovation moving faster than we can cope with. In [...]

Can the global economy's current short-term cheerfulness last? China’s re-opening matters globally, so does its ageing. Why going green is good not only for the environment but also for society and the economy too. National security trumps almost everything and determines ‘investibility’. There are two sides to the Chat GDP AI story. But, in the context of green tech, AI [...]

2023 will see: concatenation of risks and disruptions and a rising risk of stagflation. Persistent investor uncertainty. China’s growth story in disarray. The tech finance model in shreds - capital has lost patience. The state’s role on the rise. Nature becoming business and investor relevant. Plus other rays of hope: populism reaching its zenith? [...]