Global ETF News Older than One Year
Financial Stability Risks Grow as War Complicates Push to Contain Inflation
April 19, 2022--While no systemic event has materialized, the balance of risks has tilted more firmly to the downside.
Russia's invasion of Ukraine raises financial stability risks for the world and poses questions about the longer-term impact on economies and markets.
The war, amid an already slowing recovery from the pandemic, is set to test the resilience of financial markets and poses a threat to financial stability as discussed in our latest Global Financial Stability Report.
Ukraine and Russia face the most pressing risks. Yet it is already clear that the severity of disruptions in commodity markets and to supply chains are creating downside risks by weighing adversely on macrofinancial stability, inflation, and the global economy.
Source: IMF
Is the environment or economy a bigger priority? A view from the US
April 19, 2022-- Data shows how US attitudes on whether to prioritize the environment or the economy has changed over time.
The chart below shows how public opinion has shifted.
The battle in the minds of people in the U.S. between prioritizing the environment (even at the risk of curbing economic growth) or the economy (even if the environment suffers), has been a bit of a rollercoaster over the last few decades.
As Gallup survey data shows, back in the 80's and 90's, the environment was the clear winner in this moral dilemma when looked at nationally. This however, started to change as the new millennium commenced.
As our infographic illustrates, the struggle in the U.S. between the two really came to a head as the effects of the 2008 financial crisis started to bite. In March 2009, the economy had shifted to the forefront of most people's minds, with a majority (51 percent) choosing the economy as a priority, compared to 42 percent favoring the environment. Mother Earth did eventually start to gain control over American hearts and minds again between 2015 and 2019, but the Covid-19 pandemic appears to have shifted the balance once again in 2020 and 2021.
Source: weforum.org
War Dims Global Economic Outlook as Inflation Accelerates
April 19, 2022--The effects of the war will propagate far and wide, adding to price pressures and exacerbating significant policy challenges.
Global economic prospects have been severely set back, largely because of Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
This crisis unfolds even as the global economy has not yet fully recovered from the pandemic.
Even before the war, inflation in many countries had been rising due to supply-demand imbalances and policy support during the pandemic, prompting a tightening of monetary policy. The latest lockdowns in China could cause new bottlenecks in global supply chains.
In this context, beyond its immediate and tragic humanitarian impact, the war will slow economic growth and increase inflation. Overall economic risks have risen sharply, and policy tradeoffs have become even more challenging.
view the IMF World Economic Outlook- War Sets Back the Global Recovery-April 2022
Source: IMF
Private Debt to Weigh on Global Economic Recovery
April 18, 2022--A record rise in private debt could slow the economic recovery, but the drag on growth will vary across countries and within them.
Governments succeeded in lessening the economic pain of the pandemic by providing plenty of liquidity to stricken consumers and businesses through credit guarantees, concessional lending and moratoriums on interest payments.
But although these policies proved effective in supporting balance sheets, they also led to a spike in private debt, extending a steady increase in leverage spurred by supportive financial conditions since the global financial crisis of 2008.
Global private debt surged by 13 percent of the world's gross domestic product in 2020-faster than the rise seen during the global financial crisis and almost as fast as public debt.
Source: imf.org
Global Economic Uncertainty, Surging Amid War, May Slow Growth
April 15, 2022--As the war in Ukraine unfolds, global uncertainty has surged, according to the latest reading of the World Uncertainty Index-a quarterly measure across 143 countries. This increase is a bad sign for growth. Our research finds that such increases foreshadow significant output declines. Based on our estimates, the rise in uncertainty in the first quarter could be enough to reduce full-year global growth by up to 0.35 percentage point.
While global uncertainty reached unprecedented levels with the initial coronavirus outbreak, it then fell sharply. However, the World Uncertainty Index rebounded in the first quarter, reaching levels close to what was seen around the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in the United States and the United Kingdom's 2016 vote to leave the European Union.
Source: IMF
Russian oil supply drop to double in May, says IEA
April 13, 2022--The impact of sanctions and buyer aversion on Russian oil will take full effect from May onwards, the International Energy Agency said on Wednesday.
Countering that, expected lower demand in China, output increases from OPEC+ producers and beyond plus a record draw on emergency oil storage by the United States and its IEA member allies ought to prevent any sharp deficit, the agency said.
Source: reuters.com
Clean Energy 101: Hydrogen
What is Hydrogen and How Does it Fit into a Decarbonized Future?
April 13, 2022-Hydrogen has an essential role to play in the global effort to decarbonize the economy. How big a piece in the puzzle it is and where it best fits are two questions top of mind for business leaders and policymakers. To help inform this discussion, RMI will be publishing a new article series to help dispel misinformation about hydrogen. To start us off, this article explains what hydrogen is and where it can fit in the energy system.
The Basics
Hydrogen is the most abundant chemical element in the universe. You may remember from grade-school science that it is the first element in the periodic table-the lightest, consisting of one proton and one electron. Hydrogen is highly reactive and a potent energy carrier.
Hydrogen is an essential element for life on earth. It makes up all living things - including plants, animals, and you and me- and is also found in molecules like water (it is the H in H2O) that enable life to exist and in fossil fuels like natural gas and coal. However, a significant amount of energy is needed to break down a molecule to get pure hydrogen, and that energy must be supplied either by heat or electricity.
Source: rmi.org
Money is about to enter a new era of competition
April 12, 2022--Digital technology is poised to change our relationship with money and, for some countries, the ability to manage their economies.
Money is one of humankind's most remarkable innovations. It makes it possible to trade products and services across great geographic distances, between people who may not know each other and have no particular reason to trust each other.
It can even be used to transfer wealth and resources over time. Without money, trade and commerce-all human economic activity, really-would be severely constrained in terms of time and space.
The privilege of issuing money is synonymous with economic power. So it should come as little surprise that history is replete with examples of currency competition, both within countries and between them. In China, home of the world's first paper money, currencies issued by private merchants and provincial governments competed for many centuries.
Source: technologyreview.com
Metaverse real estate prices are booming. This is why
April 10, 2022--Prices for land in the metaverse have surged this year, with some plots selling for millions of dollars.
Many brands want to secure space they think will be popular in the metaverse, in the same way they buy advertising space on popular websites.
PricewaterhouseCoopers, Adidas and Warner Music Group have all invested.
But some say that location might not matter in the metaverse, as headsets will allow us to teleport around.
Imagine you live in a time before the internet. When we all had to work in offices, go to shops to buy things, when TV couldn't be streamed on demand and when most monetary transactions were made using notes and coins.
Source: weforum.org
Proof of Stake Explained
April 8, 2022--Proof of stake is a consensus mechanism used to verify new cryptocurrency transactions. Since blockchains lack any centralized governing authorities, proof of stake is a method to guarantee that data saved on the network is valid.
What Is Proof of Stake?
Decentralization is at the heart of blockchain technology and cryptocurrency. There's no central gatekeeper to manage a blockchain's record of transactions and data. Instead, the network relies on an army of participants to validate incoming transactions and add them as new blocks on the chain.
Proof of stake is the consensus mechanism that helps choose which participants get to handle this lucrative task-lucrative because the chosen ones are rewarded with new crypto if they accurately validate the new data and don't cheat the system.
Source: forbes.com
