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Alan Beattie

Senior Trade Writer

Alan Beattie writes the Trade Secrets newsletter every Monday and an opinion column each Thursday, covering international trade, globalisation, the intersection of geopolitics and economics and the world financial system.

Based in London, he was previously the FT's international economy editor and world trade editor and has been also been based in Washington and Brussels for the FT. He is the author of False Economy (Penguin, 2009), a popular economic history of the world, and Who's In Charge Here? (Penguin, 2012), an account of governments' mishandling of the global financial crisis. Before joining the FT, Alan was an economist at the Bank of England.

Email Alan Beattie @alanbeattie  on Twitter (link opens in a new browser window)

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  • Thursday, 22 February, 2024
    Trade SecretsDigital economy
    Uncertainty dogs the global digital market

    A WTO meeting next week will discuss the bizarre idea of trying to put border tariffs on data flows

    Customers at a smartphone store in Mumbai
  • Monday, 19 February, 2024
    Trade Secrets
    Driving forced labour out of supply chains starts to get serious Premium content

    European companies are facing real pressure over the use of Uyghur workers in Xinjiang

    A Porsche steering wheel
  • Monday, 12 February, 2024
    Trade Secrets
    Peering through the gloom at the WTO meeting ahead Premium content

    Prospects for the upcoming Abu Dhabi ministerial gathering don’t look great

    The Etihad Towers in Abu Dhabi
  • Thursday, 8 February, 2024
    Trade SecretsUS trade
    The US can lead on trade despite storms of criticism over Gaza

    There is no single liberal international order embracing both economics and foreign policy

    Joe Biden with Indonesia’s president, Joko Widodo, in the White House last year
  • Monday, 5 February, 2024
    Trade Secrets
    The geopolitical EU learns to play the hypocritical game Premium content

    Threatening member states and fracturing the single market are the price of supporting Ukraine

    Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orbán
  • Thursday, 1 February, 2024
    Trade SecretsUK universities
    The education exports that governments would rather ignore

    Ministers should explain the benefits and address the costs of attracting foreign students

    Students walk through the London School of Economics campus in London
  • Monday, 29 January, 2024
    Trade Secrets
    How Brussels can precision-tune its instruments of trade conflict Premium content

    EU faces fine judgments about deploying its legal tools against the US and China

    A huge solar panel farm stretching into the distance
  • Friday, 26 January, 2024
    The Big Read
    The risks of relying on superpowers to protect global trade

    History tells us that entrusting a dominant military force with the stability of maritime commerce can stir up trouble

    A sailor on an aircraft carrier holds up lightsticks to guide a fighter jet. The US and UK carried out additional strikes against Houthi targets in Yemen on Monday January 22
  • Thursday, 25 January, 2024
    Trade SecretsUS Inflation Reduction Act
    Biden’s green spending splurge is a hard model to copy

    US industrial policy is too expensive and China-sceptic to become a global standard

    A man in suit stands on a podium inside a factory and addresses a crowd of people
  • Monday, 22 January, 2024
    Trade Secrets
    Emission impossible and the trade conundrum of calculating carbon Premium content

    EU’s measurement method for its carbon border tax likely to become an international standard

    A smokey steel plant owned by British Steel
  • Thursday, 18 January, 2024
    Trade SecretsGlobal trade
    The world cannot depend on the US to keep trade peace

    Relying on American military power to protect Red Sea shipping routes is risky

    A Houthi fighter stands on a cargo ship in the Red Sea. There’s a sense the group wouldn’t be attacking ships had the US not provided such support to Israel
  • Monday, 15 January, 2024
    Trade Secrets
    The red ink that flows from the Red Sea attacks Premium content

    Economic damage from blockage to Suez Canal is serious but not crippling

    An RAF Typhoon aircraft returns to base in Cyprus after striking military targets in Yemen
  • Thursday, 11 January, 2024
    Trade SecretsGlobal migration
    The immigration smokescreen is beginning to lift

    Governments are performatively hostile to asylum seekers to distract voters from economic migrants

    An immigration officer escorts migrants picked up from the English Channel
  • Monday, 8 January, 2024
    Trade Secrets
    Why Red Sea attacks won’t derail globalisation (Probably) Premium content

    Shipping industry and world economy relatively well placed to cope with Houthi assaults

    Armed men stand on the shore of the Red Sea, while a container ship crosses the water on the horizon.
  • Monday, 18 December, 2023
    Trade Secrets
    A year of dodging trade catastrophe, but risks are looming. (Same as last year) Premium content

    Donald Trump and climate change may achieve what Covid and the US-China conflict haven’t

    Donald Trump speaking into a microphone with his right hand raised
  • Wednesday, 13 December, 2023
    Trade SecretsTechnology regulation
    Brussels setting rules for AI isn’t pretty, but someone’s got to do it

    The EU’s new tech regulations are complex but a good-faith effort to fix a problem

    France’s President Emmanuel Macron has criticised the EU’s proposed AI regime for what he sees as excessive regulatory zeal
  • Monday, 11 December, 2023
    Trade Secrets
    Beijing and Brussels are both waiting for Trump Premium content

    The EU-China relationship has sunk into mutual suspicion

    EU Council president Charles Michel, left, with Xi Jinping and Ursula von der Leyen in Beijing last week
  • Thursday, 7 December, 2023
    Trade SecretsTrade disputes
    Why export controls are failing to cripple their targets

    Diverse geopolitics, smart researchers and resourceful traders are undermining attempts to control critical products

    An oil tanker passes the Gazprom headquarters in St Petersburg
  • Monday, 4 December, 2023
    Trade Secrets
    Blame game that sabotages fight against climate change Premium content

    The politics of responsibility for carbon emissions complicate the response of both aid and trade

    A woman holds a sign reading Dignity Not Debt
  • Thursday, 30 November, 2023
    Trade SecretsUS-China trade dispute
    The fading era of hyperglobalisation is a study in success

    Worldwide integration of markets should not be pursued at all costs but should be a means to an end

    Qingdao port in China’s Shandong province
  • Monday, 27 November, 2023
    Trade Secrets
    EU puts green trade squeeze on developing world Premium content

    New environmental measures are swamping low-income countries with bureaucracy

    A tree stump
  • Thursday, 23 November, 2023
    Trade SecretsJavier Milei
    A faint chance of success for Javier Milei

    The new Argentine president’s ‘anarcho-capitalism’ undermines the idea of a unified “Global South”

    President of Argentina Alberto Fernández and president-elect Javier Milei pose for a picture
  • Monday, 20 November, 2023
    Trade Secrets
    Argentina lurches from one folly to another Premium content

    Javier Milei’s election as president puts the EU-Mercosur deal and the whole direction of South American trade in doubt

    Javier Milei
  • Thursday, 16 November, 2023
    Trade SecretsCurrency wars
    The US-China currency wars are in an unstable lull

    If Beijing returns to promoting export-led growth, tension over exchange rates may return

  • Monday, 13 November, 2023
    Trade Secrets
    The Manchinations of Senator Joe Premium content

    West Virginia Democrat shows the limits of the possible for US climate and trade policy

    Joe Manchin, the Democrat from West Virginia who last week announced he would stand down from the Senate next year
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