CAMBRIDGE — The global economy this year is full of puzzling surprises.

 CAMBRIDGE — One might think that predicting the US Federal Reserve’s next policy moves would become easier now that it has already hiked interest rates ten consecutive times, for a total of five percentage points.

CAMBRIDGE — Reacting to Silicon Valley Bank’s sudden collapse, André Esteves, a senior Brazilian banking executive, recently told Bloomberg that “SVB’s interest rate risk would’ve been obvious to any banking intern in Latin America”.

CAMBRIDGE — For three decades, businesses and governments around the world operated under the assumption that economic and financial globalisation will continue apace.

CAMBRIDGE — On the 40th anniversary of her accession to the throne, Queen Elizabeth II remarked that, “1992 is not a year on which I shall look back with undiluted pleasure. In the words of one of my more sympathetic correspondents, it has turned out to be an annus horribilis”.

CAMBRIDGE  —  The United Kingdom has had a sobering ten days, with its economy, financial system and citizens’ well-being suddenly at risk.

CAMBRIDGE  —  Financial markets’ reaction to the US Federal Reserve’s (Fed) latest policy move was reminiscent more of developing countries than of the world’s most powerful economy.

 CAMBRIDGE  —  It has been seven months since Europe and the United States imposed tough economic and financial sanctions on Russia, a G-20 country that was the world’s eleventh-largest economy on the eve of its invasion of Ukraine.

CAMBRIDGE — Big shocks to the global economy, such as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, understandably capture the most attention. But a new worldwide pattern of “little fires everywhere” may be equally consequential for longer-term economic well-being.