The Polycrisis

Market: Hey i'm worried about this Iran War?
Trump: War will end "soon but not this week"
Market:
Okay ❤️ Yay ❤️

trump ruly the master of playing the market
meme ht @kyla.bsky.social

Never miss a @katemac.bsky.social thread

Also in Pinto thread format here:

Threading some stuff about oil & oil markets, just basic but hope it helps:
1/ oil markets are what you call “finely balanced”. Supply is usually very very close to demand/consumption. Demand is hard to shift *quickly* in response to supply hiccups.
So even small supply changes = big price effects

4/ The enemy gets a vote: After Iranian fire on Gulf Kingdoms, Market and Oil traders finally woke up to LONG AND REGIONAL WAR and not their head in the sand view of a SHORT AND CONTAINED war.
Read our @thepolycrisis.bsky.social Dispatch: buttondown.com/polycrisisdi...
bsky.app/profile/70sb...

What.a.week Sanchez is our best friend now

Why were oil & financial markets so slow to realise how bad this war will be, and how hard it will be to end?
buttondown.com/polycrisisdi...

END/ 2 wars in 4 years. This war will accelerate Solar +Batteries + EVs as real Energy Security

"rest of the world will learn an important lesson from China. Build out your renewables so you aren't as dependent on imported fossil fuels & the whims of idiots"

Be like Spain.
bsky.app/profile/jere...

NEW @thepolycrisis.bsky.social If you had told me a year ago that Canada would be leading the charge to build a new global order less reliant on the US, I would have laughed.

Can American Allies bypass the flailing predatory Hegemon? www.phenomenalworld.org/analysis/con...

Facts on the Ground | Alex Turnbull Mapping uncertainty and information in the global energy system

"Energy prices going to the moon are a problem, and we need to decarbonize while some fossil fuel extraction continues. The dilemma is how to navigate these tensions while transitioning a system that was already lacking in information in its previous state."
-> @alexbhturnbull.bsky.social in 2023

Ships in Gulf declare themselves Chinese to dodge attack At least 10 vessels have changed transponder messages in apparent attempt to avoid becoming targets

A run on US hegemony....

"Ships in Gulf declare themselves Chinese to dodge attack"
www.ft.com/content/eaec...

"At present, Europe has no sovereign digital payment system and its entire architecture depends on US service providers"

Roadmap for Euro to become a global reserve currency:
- swap lines
- own payment system
- avoid US stablecoins
- true, common safe asset
- capital markets integration

I agree 100% to the @thepolycrisis.bsky.social take on the oil issue. It’s about oil, but not because of the reasons the oil industry and petrostates rulers wants us to believe.

How to de-risk from America There is no precedent of a dominant power abandoning its primacy, as Trump is doing

Ed Luce's latest column lists examples of "around and without" including Carney's target to cut Canada's US export dependency; finally finalizing the EU-Mercosur trade agreement; UK-India deal... www.ft.com/content/331e...

Polycrisis 2025 | Kate Mackenzie, Lara Merling, Tim Sahay Diplomacy, finance, and extraction in the year ahead

When we wrote a year ago about countries organizing "around and without" the US, we didn't realise the extent to which it was western allies that would be doing this most decisively. www.phenomenalworld.org/analysis/pol...

“There's a global solar energy revolution happening led by China and it should have been one of the biggest stories of 2025
While the US is committing to a suicide pact with fossil fuels, the rest of the world is leapfrogging into cheap nearly limitless energy”
bsky.app/profile/70sb...

Screenshot of cover art of "Inflation: A guide for users and losers" by Mark Blyth and Nicolo Fraccaroli - cover shows lots of coloured post-it notes with dollar signs, that make up a big arrow pointing upwards/

Mark Blyth, co-author of "Inflation: A Guide for Users and Losers" is our holiday book club guest - *today* 3pm EST (9pm CET). You can pre-register here.
us06web.zoom.us/meeting/regi...

A Global Euro | Phenomenal World With the global monetary order on less certain ground, will Europeans seize the opportunity to make the euro a true reserve currency issuer?

The Commission, the Council and finance ministers are MIA, Vallée points out: "The conversation has been left entirely to the ECB, which cannot possibly deal with all the various dimensions of the critical, and urgent, decisions required to make the euro truly global."

Good enough? COP, trade, Mark Blyth inflation book club

Latest edition of our Dispatch email is out, telling you all about our new guest essays; what you might have missed at COP30 on industrial policy & trade; LNG updates; AI thoughts... and:
Mark Blyth inflation bookclub coming up!
buttondown.com/polycrisisdi...

A Global Euro | Phenomenal World With the global monetary order on less certain ground, will Europeans seize the opportunity to make the euro a true reserve currency issuer?

NEW: In this moment of profound uncertainty over the global monetary order, Europe needs to move swiftly on becoming a truly global currency issuer, writes @shahinvallee.bsky.social www.phenomenalworld.org/analysis/a-g...

Interesting summary over whether COP30 made much progress "on coalitions of the doing" on climate change. Modest, maybe? A new conversation on green industrialization was something I hadn't picked up on.

COP30 Without the USA | Phenomenal World Ten years after Paris, and with the conspicuous absence of the US, climate cooperation presses onward at COP30 in Belém.

Since their inception in the 1990s, UN climate conferences have aimed to achieve the unanimous consent of more than 190 countries, plus the European Union." But a growing trend in recent years is for countries to unit in smaller groups to set more ambitious targets.

COP30 Without the USA | Phenomenal World Ten years after Paris, and with the conspicuous absence of the US, climate cooperation presses onward at COP30 in Belém.

How bad was it, really? Catherine Osborn, writer of @foreignpolicy.com LatAm newsletter, reflects on COP30 in Brazil. www.phenomenalworld.org/analysis/cop...

2/ At @thepolycrisis.bsky.social , we’ve taken a special interest in the question of how India has been positioning itself in the new world order that has been emerging since 2022.

This thread is on some of those articles and interviews
phenomenalworld.org/analysis/ind...

India in the New Global Order | Shreyas Shende Between hydrocarbon coalitions and the green electric development

Thread on India @thepolycrisis.bsky.social:
"What provides India greater freedom of choice & sovereignty? Locking into hydrocarbon coalitions or doubling down on a green electrostate track?How India chooses will shape the destiny of 1.4Bn citizens—& the world"
www.phenomenalworld.org/analysis/ind...

War, Climate Crisis and the Economy: Transition Security Project Launch A collaboration between Common Wealth and Climate & Community Institute to investigate the US and UK military industrial complexes.

🚨 HAPPENING SOON!
🎟️ 620+ sign-ups!

Join us to launch Transition Security Project with a panel on the war economy, climate crisis & the geopolitics of the climate transition.

🎙️ @stephensemler.bsky.social @iliasalami.bsky.social @triofrancos.bsky.social
🪑 @lalehkhalili.bsky.social

shorturl.at/njU0q

You can choose to look up—at all that is above. Is "all-of-the-above" energy policy a smokescreen for fossil fuel lock-in? If not, why not?

This is from an anon contributor to a really cool new little newsletter/journal from @advaitarun.bsky.social, Daevan Mangalmurti, and @aasthauprety.bsky.social caravanseraiforum.substack.com

You can choose to look up—at all that is above. Is "all-of-the-above" energy policy a smokescreen for fossil fuel lock-in? If not, why not?

ALL OF THE ABOVE? "There are contexts where building a broad energy portfolio makes sense, such as in research and development of new technologies, where failure is part of the process. But when applied to infrastructure, regulation, and deployment, the lack of prioritization becomes a liability."

Access Denied? The Sino-American Contest for Military Primacy in Asia Abstract. How has the balance of power shifted in maritime East Asia, and what does this change mean for the U.S.-China military competition in the region? We examine these questions by focusing on a ...

"Beijing has launched dozens of new satellites and other sensors to locate US forces & 100s of increasingly accurate missiles—ballistic, cruise,& hypersonic—to strike airfields & ships throughout the region. Washington has countered by improving US missile defenses..."
direct.mit.edu/isec/article...

China warns EV makers to stop price-cutting to protect the economy Overcapacity and oversupply are causing ‘involution’ and putting growth at risk, manufacturers told

2/ Is the Chinese central govt pushback on involution.
The brutal competitiveness of what @70sbachchan.bsky.social calls the "fitness centre" of Chinese domestic markets has become so intense that companies are cutting prices below costs. www.theguardian.com/business/202...

EU to demand technology transfers from Chinese companies New requirements will apply to batteries but could be expanded to other green sectors

So here are the actual things that I was looking for:
1/ Total reversal of the old "China steals western IP" story. Now it is China with the tech and know-how. Late last year the EU inserted tech transfer provision into its Innovation Fund call for EV battery grants www.ft.com/content/f4fd...