Bloomberg Surveillance · Thursday, September 10, 2026
Tina Fordham, author of 'Mad World,' argues that the world is experiencing a 'geopolitical super cycle' characterized by a tripling of geopolitical shocks and the erosion of buffers that previously absorbed them. She highlights the withdrawal of US leadership as a fundamental shift, moving away from the Pax Americana era. Fordham identifies climate change, conflict, cyber attacks, and tariffs/sanctions as key drivers of these shocks, impacting markets and corporate strategies.
“So this is my term, obviously used in this context most often for commodities, but in astronomy, it refers to expansion. And we published this research back in 2024 because we observed through a database that we constructed and our analytical approach, a tripling of geopolitical shocks before the 2025 and Trump 2.0.”
“The average CEO is 55. I'm a little older than that. This book, Mad World, is also a great song from Generation X. This is a book for Generation X leaders in particular who are having, Paul, as you say, a great deal of trouble adjusting to the fact that the single biggest change is is the withdrawal of the U.S. as the backstop for trade and security and what that means.”
“Climate change events, conflict. State-sponsored cyber attacks, which is a slightly different metric. Tariffs and sanctions, which increased tenfold, again, before Liberation Day. This is part of an accelerating trend. And our thesis says that an increase in drivers, which is things like trust or inequality, for example. An erosion of buffers, guardrails, if you like, means more shocks. And that's why we're seeing a steady increase.”