2022 - 10 Predictions of Changing World Order
Power shifting, covid pandering, huge capital investments and FIFA's healing energy
This feels taboo to put out my predictions for the year nearly a week and a half after the start of the year but it’s been busy times over. I feel I’ve had the slight benefit of a peek-a-boo around the corner with how the year began but there’s still merit to lay a few predictions on the line. I wouldn’t miss my shot to make some asinine predictions that I can laugh at 350 days from now, here goes what I think will happen:
We’ve been holding on to the world power chairman role since 1944 after the modern day monetary system was created from the IMF. I think the rhetoric around the changing world order will intensify and this year we will see global political leaders start to deprioritize and discount the US’s opinion in key matters around global politics - especially as our financial position weekends with ~$30T in sovereign debt. (Blog post to come soon on further explanation) I think we will see a number of non-violent but rhetorically confrontational standoffs with China and Russia that will make US look quite wimpish. We are already buckled up to see what happens with Russia/Ukraine and whether the threat of US sanctions changes anyones’ behavior.
Electric Vehicle adoption rates will finally start to improve dramatically. I believe by the end of the year we will see another 2% of cars on the road become electric (up from around 1%). Tesla finished 2021 with nearly $1mm vehicle deliveries and 2022 will see over 500 new models released ranging from a $20k Mazda to $160k Lucid. There will be something for everyone and I think this will be the hottest topic amongst consumers especially while federal rebates incentivize behavior. I know personally the next car I drive will be electric (obviously given my new company I’m helping build…more to come) but I think many of you are starting to think about it as well and likely will pull the trigger this year.
DAOs / SPACs / DEFi finally meet its regulatory match. My friend Brett launched a DAO called FriesDAO to buy up fast food chains. They’re raising $20mm in a DAO structure to go buy up fast food joints off the back of a few thousand DAO members’ capital. I don’t know about you but that sounds like a slight deviation from a syndicated investment or a blind pool investment pool. I dig the ingenuity and hope FriesDAO crushes it and offers free guac but I know the SEC is going to want to better understand these things and put some legal frameworks around them…as long as they operate here in the US. Leave it to the DAOs though to figure out how to incorporate and do business in a non-geographically identified place (oh wait they call that the metaverse?!)
The battleground in America will be around the youth education system. We are now approaching two years of discontinuous learning for our nations youth. Teachers unions and school unions have over indexed on the physical health and protection of our youth against COVID (who have the lowest risk of serious COVID consequences) vs. trying to understand the mental and learning handicapping caused by the pandemic. This will once again push more migratory patterns. This will only further the divide of economic and social prosperity between states as well as urban/suburban attractiveness.
The zero sum nature of expensive and overly punitive states will be the gain of the more freedom touting states. You can agree or disagree with their approaches but the narrative and story is overwhelmingly pulling people. I think we will see another year of strong migration to Florida, Texas, Arizona, Nevada, North & South Carolina, Georgia and Tennessee. My prediction is that Florida will take the 1st place for UHaul’s one way inbound migration statistic (TX was #1 in 2021) and New York State will take 1st place for UHaul’s one way outbound (CA was #1 in 2021).
Variant Pi and Variant Rho will both present themselves to us in 2022. The variant fatigue though has surpassed its manageable level and I think Fauci and the CDC will change their tone entirely to move toward a less constrictive approach. Many people will remain scared and stay in isolation and many other people will further ignore any apparent risks of the variants; the further dividing of a nation into two worlds and ideologies.
This year we will see another year of risk-on in the capital markets. We will see another strong year of capital outflows into tech and growth stocks, second only to 2021s’ record. We will see interest rate hikes but we won’t see such significant movements that it’ll dramatically change the investing strategy of large private investment managers. Venture capital will have yet again another banner year for investment.
The return to office will be in vogue. The narrative will switch from, “keep working in your jammies but get the job done” to “its time to get back to work, throw on your button down, it’s time to get serious.” This might be a bit self-guided but while I thought I could be very productive at home, I’ve missed the office environment and creating another space dedicated to productivity. I think we will see office occupancy levels surpass 75% in many of the major cities in America except San Francisco by the end of the year.
This FIFA world cup will be one of the most memorable international competitions in history and will be the worlds’ welcome back party. After a very underwhelming summer olympics in Japan in 2021, the 2022 world cup will be a monumental, moving and exciting showcasing of the worlds’ collective energy. There will be tributes to the destruction of the pandemic but there will be a celebratory energy in the air. My bold prediction here is that the Netherlands will win the cup.
Climate change discussions will rage into 2022 and I believe we will hear about the first successful large scale carbon sequestration project in the US that will get national acclaim and we will hear about the successful launch, or sizable pilot, of a nuclear fusion plant in China that will propel them to become the worlds’ leader in clean energy. The narrative will move from “China is the dirty pollutant of the world” to “China is at the forefront of clean tech innovation.”
But hey, what do I know 🤷🏻♂️
Your predictions, while very interesting, could well be very realistic.......Time will tell!
I completely agree on point 1, that international relations issues will surge back to the forefront as the post-WWII order continues to be challenged and isolationist tendencies have been given added momentum during the Covid era.