The Business Times

Ruchir Sharma

CHAIR OF ROCKEFELLER INTERNATIONAL

Much of the trillions of dollars in stimulus rolled out during and after the pandemic is still sloshing around the system and continues to drive the momentum trade across many assets, including stocks and gold.

Why gold and stocks are partying together

These booms are connected, but not in the way you may have heard

So far in 2025, every major sector from utilities and industrials to healthcare and banks has fared better in the rest of the world than in America. This suggests that if AI does not deliver for the US as anticipated, the country's economy and markets will lose the one leg they are now standing on.
THE BOTTOM LINE

America is now one big bet on AI

Artificial intelligence is seen as the magic fix for every threat to the US economy

It is difficult to spot symptoms of repression among the Chinese shoppers in luxury stores from Shanghai to Paris.

The myth of the suppressed Chinese consumer

In reality, the country has the fastest household spending growth rate of the 21st century

People walk along the shore of lake on a warm spring afternoon in Zurich, Switzerland April 30, 2025. REUTERS/Stefan Wermuth

The world’s strongest currency is also super-competitive 

Switzerland’s success shows that a nation can revalue its way to prosperity

Sweden has 45 billionaires, about 1.5 times more per capita than the US, which is often said to be enjoying a new gilded age.
THE BOTTOM LINE

Sweden: a socialist paradise overflowing with billionaires

The country is generating the kind of wealth that raises the risk of an anti-capitalist revolt

Having more than tripled their American equity holdings to US$20 trillion over the past decade, foreigners now own 30 per cent of the US stock market, a record high.
THE BOTTOM LINE

The end of American exceptionalism goes way beyond Trump

It has been building, and is likely to be unravelling, for a long time

The broad Chinese market has fallen sharply this decade for a variety of reasons, but it was wrong for investors to dismiss it as uninvestable.

Is China investable again?

It always was – at the right price and for those with eyes wide open to the economic downside

American consumers have not been more bullish on US stocks since surveys began tracking this sentiment. Momentum investing looks poised to crash in a way that could hit many investors hard.

Top 10 trends for 2025

Projections about the coming year assume market shifts will be dictated by Donald Trump, but the global economy is unlikely to revolve...

US earnings growth would not look so exceptional if not for the supernormal profits of its big tech firms, and massive government spending.

How ‘the mother of all bubbles’ will pop

It’s time to bet against American exceptionalism

America’s share of global stock markets is far greater than its 27 per cent share of the global economy.

The mother of all bubbles

The US has never been so overhyped, relative to the rest of the world

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