The World Bank praises the steadfastness of the global economy in 2025 and expects weak growth in 2026

Issue The World Bank forecasts for The global economy this year, expecting weak growth of 2.6%, a figure that he nonetheless considers an indicator of the resilience of The economy in the face of trade tensions.
The Washington-based bank raised its expectations "Especially for the United States of America"
The bank’s chief economist, Indermeet Gill, confirmed during a telephone press conference that "The good news is that the global economy has shown resilience in 2025. Amid political uncertainty and escalating trade tensions, we were more pessimistic at the beginning of the year, but we were wrong."

Investors’ appetite for risk

Among the factors that contributed to supporting the economy last year, Gill pointed out "Intensive storage" By companies in anticipation of tariffs, especially in the United States of America, and"Investors’ appetite for risk is stronger than expected, and the sharp increase in investment spending on new technologies, especially artificial intelligence."
But this relatively positive trend is offset by several points of concern to the World Bank, starting with the fact that "About a quarter of low-income countries have not yet returned to their economic level before the Corona pandemic"according to Indermeet Gill.

As a result, growth in developing economies is expected to slow in 2026, reaching 4% compared to 4.2% last year, while growth in low-income countries is expected to be higher, but it will not be enough to reduce the income gap with richer countries.

Per capita investment

The second point is "A long-term trend towards a potential slowdown in global growth"The chief economist at the World Bank explained this by pointing out that annual growth in per capita investment declined from 8% in the first decade of the second millennium to about 2.5% in the second decade.
He said: "This concerns us because the long-term pattern is one of demographic decline and a continuing decline in private investment, and we are currently seeing higher tariffs than in the past three or four decades, with non-tariff barriers being used as a trade policy tool."
The bank warned in its report that all of these factors may complicate the situation in low-income and developing countries, which face the need to create 1.2 billion jobs over the next ten years, in light of declining investment and general financial pressures.

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