So Brexit was not a historical accident after all. The Trump victory seals it. A complacent, mainly urban liberal class, has been undone by a revolt. Nationalists are in charge of Washington and London now. These “strongmen” and “strongwomen” will control borders, restrict the movement of labour and subject cross-border M&A to ever tighter public scrutiny tests. Security will come first. The twin freedoms of capital and labour movement are fading, secular relics from a passing liberal age.
For those of us who have been investing professionally for the past 30 years, this new creed feels alien. That, of course, is part of the message, and we have no choice but to adapt to it. The rules of the game are changing, and we have to change with it.
The tendency of “strongmen” to use the state apparatus to conjure up growth will set our new course. The tedium of recent years, slow but steady growth, looks set to be dislodged by the seductive alchemy of a fiscally induced boom-bust cycle beloved by populists.