A new World Trade Organization (WTO) report paints a two-sided picture of the global economy — one powered by artificial intelligence exports and another bracing for the chill of rising tariffs.

The trade body’s latest Global Trade Outlook and Statistics, released Tuesday, shows that world trade has found new life in 2025, driven largely by booming demand for AI-related products. But that momentum, the WTO warns, may be short-lived. The organization expects global trade to grow 2.4% this year, more than double its earlier forecast, only to drop sharply to 0.5% in 2026 once the full weight of U.S. President Donald Trump’s tariff regime takes hold.

It’s a rare case of technological optimism clashing head-on with protectionist policy.

The Tariff Trap

The WTO describes 2025 as a year of “front-loaded trade” — a global scramble to ship goods before tariffs bite. The catalyst was Trump’s sweeping tariff expansion in April, which sent shockwaves through supply chains from London to Seoul. Even the U.K., a U.S. ally, has not escaped, with a 10% baseline tariff now slapped on its exports to American markets.

Importers rushed to beat deadlines as a result, giving global trade a temporary boost of 4.9% in the first half of the year. But WTO economists caution that the rush is unsustainable. When tariffs stabilize, they say, the world may face the quiet aftermath of overstocked warehouses and slowing demand.

AI Keeps the Engines Running

The irony, however, is that the same technological forces reshaping economies — AI, automation, and advanced computing — are also propping up trade. According to the WTO, nearly half of the growth in global trade this year has come from AI-related goods like semiconductors, servers, and telecom components.

“Trade growth spanned the digital value chain, from raw silicon and specialty gases to devices powering cloud platforms and AI applications,” the report notes.

Asia, led by China, South Korea, and Taiwan, has been the epicenter of this boom, accounting for nearly two-thirds of all AI-related export growth. The United States, meanwhile, has driven about one-fifth, reflecting the fierce competition between Washington and Beijing for AI supremacy.

That rivalry is increasingly shaping trade patterns. As the U.S. imposes tariffs on Chinese goods, companies have redirected production to Southeast Asia, helping Vietnam, Malaysia, and Indonesia emerge as key players in the AI supply chain.

Cracks Beneath the Surface

Still, the WTO’s tone is far from celebratory. Behind the data lies a fragile recovery, propped up by temporary demand and a narrow slice of high-tech exports. Broader trade in goods and services remains weak, and signs of fatigue are already emerging in major economies.

Services trade, covering areas such as logistics, finance, and travel, is projected to slow from 6.8% in 2024 to 4.6% in 2025, before edging down further to 4.4% in 2026. Manufacturing confidence has dipped across Europe and North America, while consumers face stagnant wages and rising prices.

“The global economy is cooling, and trade growth will cool with it,” the WTO warns.

WTO Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala sought to strike a balance between realism and resolve. She credited “measured responses” by countries and the explosive potential of AI for helping trade stay afloat this year, but warned against complacency.

“Trade resilience in 2025 is thanks in no small part to the stability provided by the rules-based multilateral trading system. Yet complacency is not an option,” she said.

In her view, the world is at an inflection point — between a new era of digital-led globalization and a retreat into trade nationalism.

“Today’s disruptions to the global trade system are a call to action,” she said. “Nations must reimagine trade and lay a stronger foundation that delivers greater prosperity for people everywhere.”

The bottom line of the WTO’s message is that technology may be fueling trade, but politics is steering it. The world’s ports are humming again, powered by shipments of chips and servers. Yet behind that hum lies a note of uncertainty — one that could soon echo across the global economy once the tariff surge settles and the AI boom cools.

Professional services giant Deloitte has announced a sweeping new enterprise deal with Anthropic, the maker of the Claude chatbot, in what the firm called a “landmark partnership” to deepen its artificial intelligence capabilities across its global operations.

Yet, the timing of the announcement has stirred attention — and irony — as it coincided with revelations that Deloitte would refund the Australian government for submitting a report tainted by AI-generated inaccuracies.

According to the Financial Times, the Australian Department of Employment and Workplace Relations said Deloitte would have to refund the final installment of its A$439,000 (about $283,000) contract after a review revealed the report it delivered earlier this year contained multiple factual errors and citations to non-existent academic papers. A corrected version was quietly uploaded to the department’s website last week.

The review, which had been billed as an “independent assurance report,” had been prepared for the government to assess policy effectiveness, but ended up being undermined by reliance on AI tools that produced fabricated information.

The Australian Financial Review, which first reported on the errors in August, noted that the incident prompted internal questions within Deloitte about the use of generative AI in research and advisory services. The consulting firm has since promised to tighten its internal review processes for AI-assisted work.

While that story was unfolding, Deloitte was simultaneously unveiling its AI expansion with Anthropic, announcing that Claude, Anthropic’s flagship chatbot, would soon be rolled out to the firm’s nearly 500,000 employees worldwide. The two companies first partnered in 2023, but the new deal — described by Anthropic as a “strategic alliance” — significantly scales up the collaboration.

Under the agreement, Deloitte and Anthropic plan to co-develop compliance-oriented AI products designed for highly regulated industries such as finance, healthcare, and public services. Deloitte also intends to deploy “AI personas” — tailored versions of Claude — to support various internal departments, including accountants, auditors, and software developers.

“Deloitte is making this significant investment in Anthropic’s AI platform because our approach to responsible AI is very aligned,” said Ranjit Bawa, Deloitte’s global technology and ecosystems and alliances leader, in a company blog post. “Together we can reshape how enterprises operate over the next decade. Claude continues to be a leading choice for many clients and our own AI transformation.”

The financial terms of the deal were not disclosed, but Anthropic described it as the largest enterprise deployment of Claude to date, a sign that major consulting firms are now racing to embed generative AI tools at the core of their service delivery models.

Still, the juxtaposition of the two announcements — Deloitte expanding its AI footprint while refunding a government client for AI-generated misinformation — has raised uncomfortable questions about corporate responsibility in deploying generative AI.

In recent months, several organizations have faced similar missteps as generative AI tools have been caught fabricating data or references. In May, the Chicago Sun-Times admitted that part of its annual summer reading list was generated by AI and included nonexistent book titles. Internal documents from Amazon also revealed that the company’s AI productivity tool, Q Business, had struggled with accuracy and reliability in its first year of rollout.

Even Anthropic, Deloitte’s new partner, has not been immune. Earlier this year, its legal team apologized after Claude fabricated a legal citation used in a court filing related to a dispute with music publishers. The company later said the incident highlighted the importance of “human oversight” when using generative models in high-stakes contexts.

However, the controversy illustrates the central paradox confronting the consulting world, where firms are racing to capitalize on the AI boom to boost efficiency and revenue, yet they are simultaneously struggling to control the very technology they are selling as transformative. The firm’s alliance with Anthropic could help shape the next era of AI-driven consulting, but it also serves as a cautionary tale about the growing pains of automation at scale.

At its core, the saga captures the uneasy intersection of ambition and accountability in the generative AI revolution — where companies eager to lead may find themselves humbled by the same technology they seek to master.

The global financial landscape is quietly reorganizing itself. In the last decade, we saw fintechs nibble at the edges of traditional banking. But today, a more seismic shift is underway—U.S. dollar-backed stablecoins. According to a new report by Standard Chartered, as much as $1 trillion could exit emerging market banks and move into stablecoins within the next three years.

The reason is simple: people no longer trust the promise of “return on capital” when “return of capital” has become the supreme pursuit. In countries like Nigeria where currency depreciation is a recurring virus, savers now seek stability, not yield. They prefer a dollar stablecoin wallet to a naira savings account—because what is the essence of a 10% interest rate when the currency itself has lost 40% of its value?

The global financial landscape is on the brink of a major transformation as U.S. dollar-backed stablecoins continue their meteoric rise, challenging the dominance of traditional banking systems.

According to a new report by Standard Chartered, it warns that the rapid adoption of stablecoins, bolstered by supportive U.S. crypto policies, could drain up to $1 trillion in deposits away from emerging market banks within the next three years.

“We see the potential for $1 trillion to leave emerging market banks and move into stablecoins in the next three years or so,” the bank stated in its analysis released on Monday.

This reality poses existential questions for African banking. Young Nigerians are not just saving in stablecoins—they are warehousing their future in them. The implication is profound: bank deposits will deteriorate, local loanable funds will shrink, and balance sheets will weaken. As deposits fall, the capacity of banks to lend to businesses declines, tightening liquidity across the economy.

In simple terms, as stablecoins rise, naira-denominated financial intermediation falls. Yet, this is not driven by rebellion but by rationality; it is the invisible hand of self-preservation in a turbulent monetary ecosystem. And behind the curtain, the United States silently wins—because every dollar-backed stablecoin is another vote for its currency’s global supremacy.

In this transition, we are witnessing the most sophisticated form of dollarization in history. No longer does one need to physically hold greenbacks; all it takes is a blockchain wallet. While emerging economies fight inflation and instability, the U.S. dollar—through stablecoins—enters every smartphone, every crypto exchange, and every youth’s savings app. This is not just capital flight; it is trust migration.

The architecture of money is being redesigned, and the winners are those who issue the stablecoins. Every USDT or USDC held in Lagos, Nairobi, or Johannesburg strengthens the dollar’s gravitational pull while weakening local monetary sovereignty.

Africa must therefore act. The time for central banks to merely regulate is gone; now, they must innovate. Nigeria’s banks and regulators must not dismiss this wave as another crypto fad. They must create naira-backed digital assets, integrate programmable money into their systems, and redesign incentives that make banking competitive in the age of decentralization.

Because if this trend continues, Africa’s banking system may survive—but its economic soul will not. In this new world, where young people choose return of capital over return on capital, the nation that understands trust will become the nation that controls wealth. And today, that nation is the United States—powered by code, trust, and stablecoins.

Trading in the shares of International Energy Insurance Plc (IEI) has officially resumed on the Nigerian Exchange Limited (NGX) after more than a month-long suspension, following the company’s compliance with regulatory requirements and the release of its 2024 audited financial statements.

The insurer disclosed this in a notice to the NGX on Monday, confirming that the exchange had lifted the trading suspension placed on its shares on September 1, 2025. The suspension had been imposed over delays in filing its audited accounts, which the company has now rectified.

“The lifting of the suspension marks a new chapter in our journey of recovery and growth. With this step, we are focused on rebuilding investor confidence and delivering long-term value for all stakeholders,” the company said in a statement.

IEI’s shares, which trade under the ticker INTENEGINS, returned to the market on October 2. Despite sliding over 10 percent month-to-date, the stock has seen renewed trading momentum, with more than seven million shares changing hands in the days following the resumption.

The development is one of several key milestones for the insurer, which has been working to restructure its balance sheet and restore investor trust after years of financial turbulence.

Daewoo Loan Settlement and Norrenberger Takeover

In what has been described as a major turning point, IEI also announced that it has completely exited its long-standing loan with Daewoo Securities, now known as Mirae Asset Securities (UK) Limited.

The loan, a JPY 1.85 billion zero-coupon bond originally issued in January 2008 and due for repayment in 2028, had weighed heavily on the company’s financial health for years. However, during its Annual General Meeting in Jigawa on April 10, 2025, shareholders approved a debt-transfer plan to Norrenberger Advisory Partners Limited (NAPL), which took over responsibility for settling the bond.

By August 2025, IEI confirmed that NAPL had fully repaid the Daewoo bond—an event that capped years of restructuring and effectively cleared one of the company’s most significant liabilities.

The repayment followed Norrenberger’s acquisition of a 50.61 percent controlling stake in IEI in 2021 through a mandatory takeover bid involving 649.8 million shares. That acquisition, which transferred management control to the investment firm, was aimed at stabilizing IEI’s operations and positioning it for growth after a prolonged period of losses.

Financial Performance: Signs of Stability Amid Lower Earnings

While the company’s recent results show mixed performance, there are signs of gradual recovery. For the half-year ended June 30, 2025, IEI reported a pre-tax profit of N679.1 million, down from N1.04 billion recorded in the same period of 2024.

Insurance revenue declined to N2.3 billion, compared to N3 billion a year earlier. However, insurance service expenses fell to N866 million from N1.2 billion, while insurance service results stood at N1.2 billion, a decline from N1.6 billion in 2024.

Net investment income also dropped by 8.84 percent to N237.2 million, bringing the combined net insurance and investment income to N1.49 billion—a 22.7 percent year-on-year decline.

Despite lower earnings, the company’s balance sheet strengthened modestly. Total assets rose to N17 billion from N16.8 billion in 2024, while total liabilities decreased slightly to N24.06 billion from N24.4 billion in the prior year.

These figures, analysts say, suggest the company is gradually stabilizing following years of financial distress and restructuring. The lifting of the trading suspension, coupled with the complete repayment of the Daewoo bond, could signal a new phase for the insurer—one centered on capital rebuilding, governance strengthening, and renewed investor engagement.

As IEI turns the page on a turbulent chapter, its immediate focus appears to be on consolidating the gains from the Norrenberger-led restructuring while pursuing fresh business growth in Nigeria’s competitive insurance industry.

Some analysts believe that with improved compliance, cleaner balance sheets, and clearer governance, the company may now be in a position to restore market confidence and reposition itself as a key mid-tier player in Nigeria’s insurance sector.