World Economy Review - January 2019
China`s GDP growth, %
The world economy is headed for a period of "dull, low" growth, according to fund manager Janus Henderson, but the risk of an outright recession remains small.
Market participants are increasingly worried about the prospect of a serious economic downturn this year.
A long-running U.S.-China trade war and uncertainty around the U.K.`s exit from the European Union has soured business and consumer sentiment in recent months.
Most economists, as well as some the world`s business elite, agree that economic growth is slowing but policymakers have expressed some hope for a soft landing rather than a full-blown recession.
"There is definitely a slowdown in the momentum of the global economy. I don`t think the economy is going to be as strong as it was last year," Jane Shoemake, investment director of global equity income at Janus Henderson Investors, told CNBC`s "Squawk Box Europe" on Monday.
"Our central forecast is not for a recession… It is just for dull, low growth," she added.
In contrast, Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman warned earlier this month that there is a significant chance the world economy is headed for a recession either later this year or early next year.
Krugman warned there is "quite a good chance" of a recession in 2019, adding he was worried economic policymakers "do not have an effective response" if the economy slows down.
At the start of February, the European Commission sharply downgraded its forecast for euro zone economic growth in 2019 and 2020.
The Commission said euro zon...
The World Economy
World GDP Growth, %
The world economy can be evaluated in various ways, depending on the model used, and this valuation can then be represented in various ways (for example, in 2006 US dollars). It is inseparable from the geography and ecology of Earth, and is therefore somewhat of a misnomer, since, while definitions and representations of the "world economy" vary widely, they must at a minimum exclude any consideration of resources or value based outside of the Earth.
For example, while attempts could be made to calculate the value of currently unexploited mining opportunities in unclaimed territory in Antarctica, the same opportunities on Mars would not be considered a part of the world economy - even if currently exploited in some way - and could be considered of latent value only in the same way as uncreated intellectual property, such as a previously unconceived invention. Beyond the minimum standard of concerning value in production, use, and exchange on the planet Earth, definitions, representations, models, and valuations of the world economy vary widely.
It is common to limit questions of the world economy exclusively to Human economic activity, and the world economy is typically judged in monetary terms, even in cases in which there is no efficient market to help valuate certain goods or services, or in cases in which a lack of independent research or government cooperation makes establishing figures difficult. Typical examples are illegal drugs and prostitution, which by any standard are a part of the world economy, but for which there is by definition no legal market of any kind.