January 2024Geopolitics and the geometry of global tradeAuthorsJeongmin SeongOlivia WhiteMichael BirshanLola WoetzelCamillo LamannaJeffrey CondonTiago DevesaEditorJanet BushMcKinsey Global InstituteThe McKinsey Global Institute was established in 1990. Our mission is to provide a fact base to aid decision making on the economic and business issues most critical to the world’s companies and policy leaders. We benefit from the full range of McKinsey’s regional, sectoral, and functional knowledge, skills, and expertise, but editorial direction and decisions are solely the responsibility of MGI directors and partners.Our research is currently grouped into five major themes: — Productivity and prosperity: Creating and harnessing the world’s assets most productively — Resources of the world: Building, powering, and feeding the world sustainably — Human potential: Maximizing and achieving the potential of human talent — Global connections: Exploring how flows of goods, services, people, capital, and ideas shape economies — Technologies and markets of the future: Discussing the next big arenas of value and competitionWe aim for independent and fact-based research. None of our work is commissioned or funded by any business, government, or other institution; we share our results publicly free of charge; and we are entirely funded by the partners of McKinsey. While we engage multiple distinguished external advisers to contribute to our work, the analyses presented in our publications are MGI’s alone, and any errors are our own.You can find out more about MGI and our research at www.mckinsey.com/mgi.MGI Partners Michael Chui Mekala Krishnan Anu Madgavkar Jan Mischke Jeongmin Seong Tilman TackeMGI Directors Sven Smit (chair) Chris Bradley Kweilin Ellingrud Sylvain Johansson Olivia White Lola Woetzel1Geopolitics and the geometry of global trade At a glanceIntroduction1. Trade connects the world across geopolitical differences2. Trade reconfiguration is under way3. Different futures, different trade-offs4. Implications for business leadersAcknowledgmentsEndnotesContents34719354750512Geopolitics and the geometry of global trade — Trade in concentrated products binds geopolitically distant economies. Trade between geopolitically distant economies accounts for nearly 20 percent of global goods trade but close to 40 percent of trade in globally concentrated products—products such as laptops and iron ore for which three or fewer economies provide at least 90 percent of global exports. — Trade reconfiguration is under way. Since 2017, China, Germany, the United Kingdom, and the United States have reduced the geopolitical distance of their trade by 4 to 10 percent each. The United States has also reduced the geographic distance and diversified the origins of its trade. Meanwhile, economies of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, Brazil, and India are trading more both ...
