Danish financial intermediary, Saxo Bank, has tipped 2022 will see the green energy transition stall, Facebook make a meta-fail and US inflation top 15 per cent.
Well kind of.
The three long-shot calls feature among 10 forecast trends for 2022 dished out last week by the Copenhagen-based fintech in the latest version of its annual ‘outrageous predictions’.
While the Saxo contrarian bets are likely out-of-the-money, the underlying arguments fall into the almost plausible zone.
For example, the firm’s top tip for 2022 suggests global authorities will re-start the fossil fuel production engine in the face of high inflation, unruly populations and lagging alternative energy solutions.
Policy-makers will push out looming restrictions on fossil fuel production from five to 10 years to plug the immediate energy gap, Saxo says.
“The plan is sold as the only pragmatic way to bridge the reality of our energy-consuming present with the desired low-carbon future, while also limiting the risk of social unrest caused by rising food and energy prices,” the company says in a release.
Meanwhile, Facebook (now rebranded as Meta) falls apart as the brand continues to lose the youth vote: according to Saxo, surveys show only 27 per cent of teens today have an account with the social media pioneer compared to 94 per cent in 2012.
“In a desperate move, Meta tries to acquire Snapchat or TikTok while throwing billions of dollars into building the creepy Metaverse, which is aimed at surveilling users more directly than ever before and getting young people back into Meta’s universe of social media platforms, in the perceived wisdom that being a first mover is always best in technology,” the Saxo forecast says.
But other Saxo out-there predictions might not be quite so positive for humanity in a mixed-up bunch including:
- the US mid-term election brings constitutional crisis;
- US inflation reaches above 15% on wage-price spiral;
- EU Superfund for climate, energy and defence announced, to be funded by private pensions;
- women’s Reddit Army takes on the corporate patriarchy;
- India joins the Gulf Cooperation Council as a non-voting member;
- Spotify disrupted due to NFT-based digital rights platform;
- new hypersonic tech drives space race and new cold war; and,
- medical breakthrough extends average life expectancy 25 years.
As per previous incarnations, the Saxo outrageous predictions for 2022 are “an exercise in considering the full extent of what is possible, even if not necessarily probable”, the release says.
And, judging by the 2021 list, the forecasts are probably not recommended as the basis of a mega-trend exchange-traded fund.
Last year Saxo predicted Amazon to buy Cyprus, Germany would bail-out France and that new-age “fusion design catapults humanity into energy abundance”.
However, Saxo chief investment officer, Steen Jakobsen, said regardless of specific outcomes, the world is primed for revolutionary change.
“There is so much energy building up in our inequality-plagued society and economy. Add to that the inability of the current system to address the issue and we need to look into the future with a fundamental view that it’s not a question of whether we get a revolution but a more a question of when and how, Jakobsen said. “With every revolution, some win and some lose, but that’s not the point—if the current system can’t change but must, a revolution is the only path forward.”
Saxo sells a range of 40,000 financial products and direct trading platforms (including contracts for difference) to retail investors as well as providing technology solutions to the institutional market.
Founded in 1992, the business reports about 810,000 clients worldwide, US$80 billion in assets under management and an average 188,000 daily trades on its various platforms.