Six Trends Igniting Global Leadership in 2026
By DJ Peterson, Founder, Longview Global Advisors and Emily Day, Senior Research Associate at Longview Global Advisors / February 5, 2026
DJ Peterson founded Longview Global Advisors in 2013 and he has worked with clients in a range of sectors, including financial services, consumer goods, energy, automotive, technology, entertainment, real estate, and professional services. Earlier in his 30-year career, DJ was a researcher and consultant at the Eurasia Group, a leading global affairs advisory firm, The RAND Corporation, the original strategy think-tank, and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty.
Emily Day is a Senior Research Associate at Longview Global Advisors, where she analyzes global political and economic trends to inform Longview’s work in corporate thought leadership, communications, and executive positioning. She is also the Associate Editor of Energy World and Techland at The National Interest. Previously, Emily was a Della Ratta Energy and Global Security Fellow at the Partnership for Global Security.
DJ serves as a Skytop Contributor and as the Host of Geostrategy, a SkytopTV talk show, now streaming worldwide in 211 countries, territories and disputed regions.
In 2025, global business leaders navigated elevated policy and economic noise. A revolutionary change in the US administration, tariffs and related supply-chain adaptation, shifting US policies, and massive AI investments all contributed to increased levels of uncertainty. But, but, but: The US and global economies proved resilient and surpassed economists’ growth expectations, accompanied by easing interest rates, strong corporate balance sheets, and a pickup in dealmaking.
We believe these trends will continue into 2026, but they are less likely to be a surprise as business leaders are now internalizing policy volatility, trade frictions, and technological disruption as baseline conditions. As a result, we have exited the ‘wait and see’ era and are entering a period in which volatility in the news headlines is seen as a permanent feature of the business environment.
Navigating 2026 will require an eyes-open approach to strategy that focuses less on headlines and more on the underlying trendlines reshaping the global economy.
Below are six megatrends that will define the global business narrative in 2026.
1) Business leaders will have to cut through a blizzard of noisy, misleading headlines and see the real signal underneath. Macroeconomic growth, corporate profits, and asset prices have repeatedly surprised forecasters on the upside over the past several years. There have also been persistent disconnects between conventional wisdom, business and consumer surveys, and actual performance. For example, while policy uncertainty, as tracked by the Economist Intelligence Unit, spiked over the past year, business and investor sentiment around the world remained buoyant.
2) Washington policy is reshaping the landscape in real time that is bold in intent, provisional in execution. The framework trade agreements negotiated in 2025 are fragile, subject to modification, and—in the case of China—noncompliance. And the world’s second-largest free-trade relationship—Canada, the US, and Mexico—is up for review in 2026. In addition, many Trump policy thrusts (regarding tariffs, immigration, control of federal spending, and the Federal Reserve) are being reviewed by the courts, with important decisions expected in 2026. Midterm electioneering will force policy shifts as the administration reacts to declining poll numbers.
3) Tariff shocks were the plot twist of 2025, still echoing but no longer the headline. The average effective rate has stabilized at around 17%. Donald Trump will continue to seek to dominate the headlines (regarding Greenland and South Korea, for example), but significant new levies in 2026 are unlikely, given the White House’s newfound concerns about affordability and Republicans’ falling political ratings in an election year. Instead, expect more deals (with India, for example) and carve-outs (food and pharmaceuticals). Meanwhile, companies are reworking supply chains to mitigate the elevated tariffs that remain. Most of the inflationary impacts have now occurred.
4) For global enterprises, there is still no alternative to America. For better or worse, the US will continue to dominate the global business narrative and policy tempo, and operating in the US market will remain more advantageous than being outside it. But, but, but: Global equities, debt, and currency markets outperformed in 2025, as global investors trimmed US exposures. And American geostrategic influence is waning, as exemplified by Washington's absence from COP30 and the G20 summit and its pullback from Ukraine.
5) AI is spawning a new class of distraction risks, many are fast, seductive, and capable of derailing focus at scale. AI investment is now the dominant driver of US capital spending and trade flows. AI-linked stocks account for three-quarters of S&P 500 returns and 80% of earnings growth since 2022. But AI exuberance is masking fragilities. Harvard’s Jason Furman estimates that without the AI surge, US economic growth this year would have been nearly flat. The jobs issue will be a growing economic and political concern in 2026. Another Chinese AI breakthrough surprise (like DeepSeek a year ago) could rock expectations and markets.
6) Risk awareness has become the baseline operating condition, serving as the new default setting for global leadership. Executives are increasingly treating policy, geopolitical, and economic uncertainty as permanent and baseline features of the operating environment—not as transitory shocks. With this eyes-open awareness, companies are moving forward, and dealmaking is increasing, backed by cost-cutting, strong balance sheets, and agile strategies.