China accelerates economic decoupling process

Russia's war of aggression against Ukraine was discussed in advance between Vladimir Putin and China's President Xi Jinping at the Olympic Games in Beijing. At the summit of the so-called "Shanghai Group" (SCO) in Uzbekistan, both countries have now agreed on even closer cooperation. "The new solidarity between Putin and Xi strengthens China's strategic position. Not only the value-based global order, but also the dominance of the USA, will come under even greater pressure in the future. At the same time, China is working intensively on building a largely autonomous economic hemisphere," says Dr Heinz-Werner Rapp, founder and director of the FERI Cognitive Finance Institute.

Global system conflict intensifies

The war against Ukraine represents a new era in which great powers such as Russia and China openly oppose the Western value model and its leading power, the USA. Russia's attack is thus an expression of a hard systemic conflict between the West and a group of global challengers. This conflict is only at a relatively early stage, but will become much more intense in the coming years. "The next global fault line is in Taiwan. China's goal of 'reunification' is being pushed further by Xi Jinping and threatens to end in a direct confrontation with the USA," Rapp emphasises.

The new Russia - China axis

The Taiwan conflict and other problems between China and the USA had already reached a high level of escalation potential. Now, however, the new partnership between Russia and China adds another aspect that has great strategic significance. "By specifically using Russia as a supplier of energy and raw materials, Xi Jinping is providing China with a number of decisive advantages for the future," Rapp explains. "China thereby gains not only a permanent raw material base and new buyers for Chinese products, but at the same time a useful vassal for any future conflict with the USA," says Rapp.

China-centred hemisphere as a target

The closer ties with Russia bring Xi Jinping closer to his strategic goal of transforming China's economic and political position. "China is to be transformed from an exporting country closely integrated into the system of globalisation to the centre of a largely self-sufficient 'Chinese hemisphere' in which China sets its own rules," Rapp emphasises. China would then still have access to important transaction networks, even in the 'global South', but in doing so it could increasingly escape the existing world economic order. "The strategic decoupling from China is already underway and will continue to accelerate. Therein lies a serious risk, because a split-up of the world economy would have grave consequences. Entrepreneurs and investors should follow this new trend very closely and by no means underestimate it," says the analysis of the FERI Cognitive Finance Institute.