Publications

The United States' trade strategy aims to reduce the nation’s bilateral trade deficits to zero. This target is difficult to achieve and the product of a misdiagnosis, which is currently eroding global growth and undermining stability.

The temporary suspension of some of the measures has brought relief, but Europe and Spain have taken the opportunity to outline their strategy for addressing the increase in trade barriers and potentially more-negative scenarios.

Those who control the most powerful, smallest, and most value-added chips will have economic, political, and military hegemony in the 21st century.

The eurozone slowed somewhat more than expected in Q4 of last year, with growth shrinking to 0.1% in the quarter. Looking at individual countries, the biggest surprises were the contraction in activity in Italy (-0.3% QoQ) and France (-0.1% QoQ) and the stagnation of the German economy.

In 2019 as a whole, and in the midst of trade tensions with the US, China grew by 6.1%. This represents half a point less than in 2018, close to the lower-end of the official growth target range of 6–6.5%, representing the lowest on record since 1990.

This report presents an analysis of those global shocks, mostly of low probability, which may have a severe impact on the economy. Short-term risks have diminished on the back of easing trade tensions and interest rate cuts, but concerns on structural issues remain high (de-globalization and climate change).

The Spanish economy ends the second decade of the 21st century with a GDP growth rate close to its potential and an unemployment rate of 14.3%. During the last three quarters of 2019, GDP has grown at an annualized quarterly rate of 1.6%.