This previous yr gained’t quickly be forgotten. In 2025, typical fascinated about economics and investor habits was continuously challenged, as dramatic adjustments in expertise, vitality and geopolitics drove markets in usually sudden methods.
Because the clock turns to 2026, listed here are 8 common market movers that may assist clarify what occurred in 2025 and what it’d imply for 2026 and past.1. Commerce Turmoil
President Donald Trump’s “America First” agenda proved to be a key market driver in 2025 – notably within the first half of the yr – because the U.S. president wasted no time delivering on his marketing campaign guarantees to shift from free commerce to “truthful” commerce.
U.S. commerce coverage uncertainty – as measured by the Baker-Bloom-David mannequin – hit an all-time excessive after Trump introduced sweeping import tariffs on April 4, “Liberation Day.”
The index has since eased, but it surely stays in traditionally elevated territory, nearly double the peaks of Trump’s first administration.
2. Tariff Throwdown
Right now final yr, the typical efficient tariff price on imports into the U.S. was round 2.5%. It’s now nearly 17%, the very best stage since 1935. This represents the largest U.S. tax improve as a share of GDP in additional than 30 years.
To the shock of many, the U.S. financial system and others around the globe have coped remarkably nicely regardless of this large change in America’s commerce technique. U.S. GDP grew at a wholesome annualized price of 4.3% within the third quarter. Will customers and companies be as resilient subsequent yr? That is still an open query.
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3. Greenback’s Drop
The consensus amongst Wall Road analysts at first of 2025 was that the greenback would strengthen because the “U.S. exceptionalism” narrative and Trump administration’s onshoring attracted waves of capital from around the globe.
As an alternative, the greenback USD= has fallen round 10% in opposition to a basket of main currencies. By the tip of June, it was down 12% – its worst first half of any calendar yr for the reason that period of free-floating trade charges started over half a century in the past.
4. The “Magnificent Seven”
The “Magnificent Seven” U.S. expertise shares have dramatically outperformed in 2025, fuelled by the euphoria surrounding synthetic intelligence, however because the yr progressed, investor considerations grew relating to hyperscalers’ large, more and more debt-fuelled AI capex outlays.
The share worth efficiency of Oracle ORCL.N displays this trajectory. The U.S. cloud computing big’s inventory rose 36% in a single day in September on constructive income projections, then started to slip, dropping 15% in two days earlier this month – a magnitude of decline seen solely throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, the 2008 international monetary disaster and the Nineties dot‑com crash.
If Oracle is a bellwether of traders’ broader sentiment about AI, there might be a rocky highway forward for the tech-powered fairness rally.
5. Yukon Cornelius Could be Proud
Silver & Gold costs have soared in 2025, as safe-haven demand and bets on additional U.S. rate of interest cuts have fuelled a pointy rally in treasured metals.
SilverXAG=eclipsed $80 an oz for the primary time ever on December 29, pushed by sturdy industrial demand, persistent provide shortfalls, and momentum-driven shopping for.
Whereas gold costs XAU=have fallen since hitting a record-high above $4,500 an oz final week, the yellow metallic appears set to ship its largest annual acquire since 1979.
The danger now’s that imply reversion will rear its ugly head in 2026, leading to a pointy and painful pullback.
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6. Europe’s Name to Arms
European protection shares have greater than tripled in worth since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, a battle now heading into its fourth yr. The sector has gained greater than 50% in 2025 alone, spurred by the announcement that Germany will spend as much as a trillion euros on protection and infrastructure.
This worth transfer speaks to a lot of this yr’s international themes, together with growing U.S. isolationism, rising geopolitical tensions and expectations for a European financial reboot.
And it additionally helps clarify another notable 2025 market strikes, together with the surge within the euro/greenback price EUR=, the outperformance of European shares versus Wall Road and rising long-dated German bond yields.
7. Oil Value Volatility
Oil costs LCOc1jumped from $70 to $81 a barrel after Israel launched a bombing marketing campaign in Iran on June 12, sparking fears that Tehran would block the all-important Strait of Hormuz. However the spike was short-lived because the so-called “12-day battle” ended swiftly.
This speaks to a longer-term development: geopolitical tensions nonetheless create volatility in vitality costs, however worth shifts solely stick when provide is disrupted, not merely threatened. And even then, international vitality markets are more and more in a position to adapt, lowering the danger {that a} shock occasion will trigger a persistent imbalance between provide and demand.
8. Energy Up
The U.S. battery storage market has been the most popular section of the American vitality market in 2025, with capability on monitor to leap by a report 12 gigawatts to a complete of roughly 40 GW. In the meantime, China’s exports of batteries and battery vitality storage techniques (BESS) hit a report in 2025, hovering by 24% from the yr earlier than over the primary 9 months of the yr.
Utility-scale storage techniques permit energy corporations to make higher use of renewable energy provides by storing surplus photo voltaic output that may then be discharged throughout peak energy demand durations. Battery storage can be a key development to trace within the coming yr.
(The opinions expressed listed here are these of the writer, the Editor in Cost of Reuters Open Curiosity)
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