“The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting.”

This morning – You could not make this up; an unimaginably complex WW3 Techno-thriller unfolding as markets stumble and global supply chains hover on the edge of anarchy. On the other hand, maybe that’s just the way it was planned.

I am not one for conspiracy theories. But… this morning… If I was a writer of trashy global-techno-World War 3 pulp fiction, and proposed the following scenario where the global economy lurches into an unprecedented period of instability – nobody would believe me:

1)    Global Supply Chains, weakened and struggling after a year of global pandemic, plus a growing shortage of microchips holding back multiple industrial sectors, are plunged into new crisis by a puff of wind causing a box-ship to skite sideways and block the Suez Canal, trapping East-West Trade.

2)    Unstable and over-priced Global Markets are spooked into a frenzy late on a quiet Friday night by the largest margin calls ever ($20 bln plus) as an Asian “family office” dumps billions of dollars of stock into the market. Collateral damage spreads, as other financial firms, (inevitably including Credit Suisse (Switzerland’s very own Deutsche Bank), and Nomura), announce material losses.

3)    As global central banks struggle to restore real growth, while trying to hold interest rates low and support commerce, and acutely conscious of how a market crash could crush global confidence – things suddenly get more difficult as confidence in equity valuations takes a massive knock.

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bill blain, morning porridge, supply chains, supply chain disruptions, risk