This week’s featured stories…
Welcome to the WCR weekly update. World Commerce Review is the global trade and finance platform, discussing all things political, regulatory, technological, financial and, most importantly, the future
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Global Economy
Redrawing the global trade map
Liberation Day raised an immediate question in policy circles: would other countries follow suit? Barthélémy Bonadio, Andrei Levchenko and Nitya Pandalai-Nayar study the implications of the US withdrawal from free trade
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WCR Best Trade Finance Bank 2026
World Commerce Review is pleased to announce that Euro Exim Bank Limited has been awarded the WCR Best Trade Finance Bank 2026 for the seventh year running.
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How the ledger controls monetary sovereignty and global power
Laurence B Mussio and Paul Samson explore how the ledger has proven more sovereign and powerful than the sword. In today’s era of digital currencies and evolving geopolitics around payment systems, they illuminate how global power will continue to rest with those who control the ledger
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A plan to revitalise the WTO
The WTO is experiencing a serious crisis arising from tensions that are internal to the global trading system. Ignacio García Bercero identifies four critical areas for WTO reform to reinforce the rules-based trading system
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How to get the green and the deal
Europe is recalibrating its industrial policy in response to external challenges. Maive Rute, Frank Vandermeeren and Anca Dumitrescu investigate the goals of this recalibrated approach and the key components for success
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A way out via the Strait of Hormuz
The US–Iran relationship appears to be at its lowest point in decades. Simon Johnson and Amir Kermani describe how the twin blockades of the Strait of Hormuz create the possibility of a time-consistent agreement linking the nuclear issue, sanctions relief, and uninterrupted navigation
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Reconfiguring Europe in a fractured global economy
The dramatic developments unfolding globally, spanning wars, geopolitical shifts, and trade disruptions, have caught Europe off balance. Marco Buti, Giancarlo Corsetti and Anna Peychev discuss the 2026 Florence Report and urge the EU to replace its broken ‘reduced responsibility model’ with a New European Social Contract integrating defence, finance, and the supply of public goods
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Challenging inequalities
Across developed countries there is a growing perception that social progress has stalled. Paul Johnson, James Banks, Tim Besley, Richard Blundell, Angus Deaton, Robert Joyce, and Debra Satz argue that stronger economic growth, more dynamic labour markets, and policies that help opportunities take root are essential to tackling inequalities
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From World War Trade to domino regionalism
Donald Trump’s 2025 tariffs were disruptive in the deepest sense. Richard Baldwin argues that while the old trading order was destroyed, a growing share of global commerce is drawn into existing regional trade arrangements, producing an emergent global trading order
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