WTO: Trade outlook for 2026 remains dim, but 2025 boosted by AI, front-loading

Despite “stiff headwinds” spurred by tariffs and increased uncertainty, global trade in 2025 has outperformed expectations, buoyed by artificial intelligence-related investment and North American importers’ frontloading of inventory in advance of new duties, but the outlook for next year is “less optimistic,” the World Trade Organization said on Tuesday. In an update to its Global Trade Outlook and Statistics report , the WTO revised its trade growth projection for 2025 to 2.4 percent, up from just 0.9 percent in August...