Kristalina Georgieva

Now we are seeing the payback from that investment.

That is exactly the reason why everybody's calmer, even if China-U.S.

tensions go up and down.

because there is no spillover.

But let me say this, we shouldn't be complacent.

What we see is that Chinese goods that used to come to the United States are now redirected to Asia and to the European Union.

If these recipients of Chinese goods feel the heat and decide that they too should impose tariffs, we may still have the risk of a trade war moving from one place to another.

So our message to everybody is...

Be calm.

And to China, be careful.

Do not provoke other countries to see you as a threat to their economies.

When we look at the prospects for the world economy, they're underwhelming.

Growth is slow, debt is high.

And who leads on the debt front?

Advanced economies.

They have borrowed to meet the needs of people during COVID, when we had the shock from Russia's war in Ukraine.

Now they need to pull back what they're providing as support, and it is very difficult.

People like receiving.

They don't like losing what they have got.

So we see everybody recognizing that debt needs to go down, that fiscal consolidation needs to take place.