MQG in 2025, page-65

Chanticleer Article regarding uncertainty in markets

https://www.copyright link/chanticleer/macquarie-s-viktor-shvets-sees-a-world-on-fire-here-s-how-to-play-it-20250321-p5llcz


An excerpt from the article, well worth reading the whole thing.

‘Deep structural changes’

Macquarie strategist Viktor Shvets had long argued the world was heading for a replay of the 1930s when a combination of “wars, pandemics, recessions, climate disasters, inflationary spikes and collapses, people lost trust in the system and were willing to entertain radical answers” – leading to polarisation, populism and ultimately, war.

Shvets had consistently reassured us the world wasn’t there yet – essentially, people were not angry enough. But he’s changed his mind.

“The last two months convinced us that we are already there, and debates about intensity of tariff wars, changes to S&P 500 targets or preoccupation with the Fed miss the wood for the trees: these are not short-term bumps on the road that need to be navigated, but deep structural changes.”

There are a few key implications of this. The first is that democracies will atrophy, with more and more people living in what Shvets calls “anocracies” – democracies stripped of their meaning. “Today, we are already down to less than 30 fully fledged democracies … while about 70 per cent of the world’s population already reside in various autocracies, versus 50 per cent in 2011.”

Shvets says that as in the 1930s, the world is being increasingly led by “nationalistic strongmen”. US Vice President J.D. Vance, he says, is closer to the spirit of this new age than Elon Musk.