South African analyst urges businesses to prepare for new global instability
Ronak Gopaldas, director of the consulting company Signal Risk, called on business representatives at the Institute of Retirement Funds Africa conference in Cape Town, South Africa, not to regard geopolitical tensions, trade fragmentation and economic shocks as temporary obstacles. In his view, these processes indicate the emergence of a new and unpredictable global reality, TimesLIVE reports.
Assessment of Trump’s policy
Gopaldas, who is also co-founder of Mindflux Training and a fellow at the Gordon Institute of Business Science, said that US President Donald Trump’s return to the White House had intensified the instability that had already emerged after pandemic restrictions, the inflation wave of 2022 and military conflicts in different parts of the world.
According to him, the past 30 years were more of a “holiday from history,” and the world is returning to great-power rivalry, in which the strong can impose their will on the weak. The analyst stressed that Trump’s political style should be separated from his ideas, which, in his assessment, are generally consistent.
Gopaldas described Trump’s economic approach as focused on trade wars, tax cuts, deregulation and denial of central bank independence. In his view, this doctrine is isolationist in nature and based on the principle of “America First.”
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Markets, China and consequences for Africa
The analyst believes that the global economic situation will be influenced by the confrontation between Trump, the US Federal Reserve, the bond market and China. He suggested that optimism about the development of artificial intelligence had for some time helped markets ignore geopolitical volatility, but this trend is changing, in his assessment.
Gopaldas also drew attention to uncertainty surrounding the Strait of Hormuz in the context of the war in Iran. According to him, for African states, the consequences of instability will concern food, fertilizers and fuel.
Nancy Andrews, president of the Institute of Retirement Funds Africa, said for her part that pension funds operate at the intersection of people’s expectations for a secure future and current economic, social and regulatory conditions. She called on funds and their trustees to test their own assumptions, ensure the resilience of investment decisions and pay attention to good governance.
