Ahead of the COP26 conference in Glasgow in November, the overarching theme for this year’s IIF annual meeting this week is sustainability. But speakers also have inflation and supply chains on their minds.
Keiko Tashiro, Daiwa Securities Group’s deputy president, head of overseas operations and head of sustainable development goals (SDGs), reckons that inflation can be tackled, not least because the US Federal Reserve and China have the tools to do so.
“We don’t see across-the-board inflation,” she notes, despite energy price rises that could disrupt some economies.
Central banks have tricky calls to make, and we all depend on them getting them right
She says she anticipates the Fed will “do its job”, and that inflation will not get out of control.
In any case, “inflation in Japan is not going to be an issue for a while,” she adds.
Standard Chartered group chairman José Viñals sees an uneven recovery taking place, despite noting that global trade is some 3% higher than it was before coronavirus hit. The US and China are the main engines of growth, but many other economies have seen their post-pandemic reopening moderate somewhat.
Supply-side
