Eastern Europe / Opinion
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HALLIGAN: Power struggle in OPEC+ is pulling oil prices down
The oil market has entered choppy waters once again. Crude prices fell by a dramatic 18% in April y/y – the sharpest monthly drop since November 2021 – partly due to a global slowdown, but more due to a power struggle within OPEC+.
COMMENT: Trump’s tariff drive hits emerging markets as growth and inflation forecasts slide – Oxford Economics
President Donald Trump’s aggressive trade policies are already casting a long shadow over emerging market economies, with analysts cutting growth forecasts and warning of prolonged investment uncertainty and policy disruption.
Post-war order teetering – rights watchdog
Eurasia “at forefront” of assault on individual freedoms.
COMMENT: Middle Corridor makes progress, but playing second fiddle to the Northern Route
The Middle Corridor linking China to Europe through the South Caucasus and Central Asia has expanded significantly in the aftermath of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, but its long-term prospects remain uncertain.
Think-tank urges EU to consider 'Big Bang' enlargement and sweeping reforms
European Policy Centre analysts call on the EU to abandon its piecemeal, hesitant approach to enlargement and commit to ‘permachange’: a permanent state of adaptation in response to cascading crises.
COMMENT: Embracing “Greater Central Asia” has become a strategic imperative for US
Wider region increasingly seen as arena in which major powers’ interests, such as in sourcing critical minerals, collide and converge.
IMF: Enhancing financial stability for resilience during uncertain times
Capital markets are essential for driving economic activity, providing mechanisms for raising funds and allocating resources efficiently. The stability of these markets and the financial institutions that intermediate them are critical.
IMF: Global debt to exceed pandemic levels soon
Global public debt is set to rise to 95% of GDP this year and will continue to climb in the next years to top 100%, says the IMF.
COMMENT: Five key trends in new global paradigm of narrow self-interest – Oxford Economics
A new global economic paradigm is taking shape as major economies pivot towards policies rooted in narrow national self-interest, a shift that political analysts at Oxford Economics believe will have lasting repercussions.
IMF: The global economy enters a new era
The global economic system under which most countries have operated for the last 80 years is being reset, ushering the world into a new era.
HALLIGAN: Mike Calvey's "Odyssey Moscow" – the story of Russia's top fund manager who ended up in jail when his partners turned on him
“How did a nice boy from Oklahoma end up living in Russia?” bne IntelliNews editor at large Liam Halligan asked legendary Russia investor Michael Calvey, a legend in the Moscow investment world, in his “When the facts change” podcast.
COMMENT: Zelenskiy is increasingly monopolising power in Ukraine
In a surprisingly negative article for the normally pro-Ukraine The Economist, the magazine has heavily criticised Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy for monopolising power and undermining its democratic institutions.
BERTRAND: Trump’s tariffs on China are the same as sanctions on Russia and will also fail
Fundamentally, the extreme tariffs on China are the exact same mistake as the sanctions on Russia and will have the same principal effect: to prove in the eyes of the world the impotence of the United States.
COMMENT: Could the US strike a deal to restart Nord Stream gas pipeline?
US President Donald Trump has made it clear that he wants to do business with Russia and tap into its vast raw material resources. But restarting the Nord Stream gas pipeline is the only US-Russian business project that looks viable.
COMMENT: Trump’s secondary sanctions on Russian oil are a lose-lose proposition – Carnegie
“Just as certain classes of medication are sometimes in vogue and prescribed to help with all kinds of ailments, it seems that US President Donald Trump and his team have stumbled upon a magical remedy for all the world’s problems: tariffs.”
HALLIGAN: Trump's tariffs are either madness or genius – it could go either way
Donald Trump has referred to tariffs as “the most beautiful word in the dictionary”. And now the US President has unleashed the most aggressive surge in American trade protectionism in almost a century.
COMMENT: Europe’s outlook improves as Trump makes Ukraine conflct progress
European leaders are alarmed at the increasingly warm relations between US President Trump and Putin, but economists are encouraged as even a “quick and dirty” ceasefire deal to the Ukraine conflict will buoy flagging CEE economies.
COMMENT: Is the EU going to fall apart?
Is the EU about to break apart under the stress of taking over the full weight of supporting Ukraine, the need to rearm and the hundreds of billions that must be invested if it is to become competitive again?
ASH: Trump delivers on Putin’s plan to ensure Ukraine fails
Trump’s peace plan is proceeding at breakneck pace but the problem is that it is Ukraine’s neck that is on the line here.
RAGOZIN: What did we die for?
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s chief of staff, Andriy Yermak, warned that a ceasefire in the Russo-Ukrainian war would be meaningless without security guarantees for Kyiv.