Geopolitics and Markets Review – 29th January 2024

Final Key Trends For 2024

Contents

• Introduction

• More Key Trends In 2024 – China, The Middle East, Rise in Nearshoring and Friendshoring, Exodus Of Former Colonisers From Africa, Rise In Independence Movements.

• Concluding Remarks

• Other News

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Bitesize Edition

• China’s economic troubles are difficult to interpret. For some analysts, they believe it will spell China’s doom. But countries of China’s size and power can’t vanish, especially with the existence of mutually assured destruction. Today, I’ll explore whether China will collapse completely as a functioning nation, only experience a decline, or if it will navigate the choppy waters it finds itself in.

• How can we expect the Middle Eastern conflict to develop over 2024? The key narrative around the world is that of a two-state solution. How can a two-state solution occur when the West Bank and Gaza aren’t physically connected? Will Gaza be rebuilt? Can the Palestinian Authority be reformed into a suitable leader of a Palestinian state? How does internal Israeli politics ensure that they continue to spread hate to further their own agendas of Palestinian aggression and the mass ethnic cleansing of Palestinians? Many questions remain.

• Will we continue to see the trends of nearshoring and friend shoring rise? Is the exodus of former colonial powers in Africa continuing in 2024? Finally, will we see the rise in independence movements in 2024? Somaliland recently made the news with its Memorandum of Understanding with Ethiopia. The Khalistan state would be a state for the Sikh independence movement, and the Kurdish population continues to be treated aggressively from all sides, especially the Turks.

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Introduction

As the first month of 2024 has almost passed, this will be my final piece on the key trends that will unfold over the remaining 11 months of 2024. Next week, I’ll start an exciting new series. More on that at the end. For now, let’s explore what I believe will be the defining trends for 2024 when we look back at the end of the year.

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More Key Trends In 2024

China – China still has big issues to contend with.

China’s real estate bubble is hugely inflated. There exist ghost cities in China, that were hidden as a promising economic activity a few years ago, until you see nobody lives in them and China suffers a net loss in migration and declining population year over year, so nobody will ever fill them. The One Child Policy ensured China’s population pyramid paints a rather problematic image. Elders are supported often by one child, with extreme pressure on grandchildren of the working population if they have parents and grandparents alive. Since the population is declining year over year, birth rates aren’t being stimulated and the problem will remain.

Photo by Tyler Nix on Unsplash

Those who read my writing know that I usually try to walk a neutral path in my analysis. Peter Zeihan predicts China will collapse entirely within a decade. This is something he’s been saying for close to a decade. Does anybody see a timing issue there? You can’t predict the future, and anybody who hyper-fixates on a negative, seemingly unimaginable outlook is doing so for two reasons. Firstly, negativity sells better than positivity. Secondly, it's dramatic, scary, and a unique perspective that is bound to grab people’s attention.