Forecasts

Low economic growth, pervasive financial risks, the stalemate in Ukraine and technological competition between the world’s largest economies will drive geopolitical risk during the third quarter.

The third quarter will see a continuation of the global two-speed recovery according to countries' access to vaccines and the success of their vaccination campaigns.

While many of the trends identified in our annual forecast remain slowed down by COVID-19, their pace is picking up as countries carefully emerge from lockdown.

The war in Ukraine will grind on over the next year, sparking a global gas crunch and challenging the post-Cold War world order.

Governments deciding how to approach global trade and economic uncertainty will home in on the U.S. presidential election in 2020 as they try to gauge Washington's future course.

Long-arching trends tend to quietly build over decades and then noisily surface as the politics catch up. The longer economic pain persists, the stronger the political response. That loud banging at the door is the force of nationalism greeting the world's powers, particularly Europe and the United States, still the only superpower.

The United States will continue to be the major economic, political and military power in the world but will be less engaged than in the past. Its low rate of exports, its increasing energy self-reliance and its experiences over the last decade will cause it to be increasingly cautious about economic and military involvement in the world.