The tariff or trade war that has been unleashed by US president Donald Trump represents a continuation of the massive geopolitical shifts that are increasingly becoming the norm.

The neoliberal economic order that produced the so-called global economy near four decades ago directly led to the creation of Bermuda becoming a key offshore financial centre. It ended with the Great Recession in 2008. However, what Trump has done is place the final nail in that coffin and buried it — even at the expense of Western allies and ironically the United States’ global dominance itself.

Let’s just call it an own goal.

This, though, marks only the beginning of an ongoing challenge for Bermuda.

After having a General Election essentially about nothing, which only reinforced the political status quo when all was said and done, we are now confronted by a new set of global conditions. These conditions are marked by uncertainty and peril.

This will certainly only worsen our already ruinous cost of living. The extraordinary worldwide inflation that Trump has unleashed will not go away even with the so-called pause to the implementation of the reciprocal tariff regime. It was the rebellion that occurred with investors in the US bond market with respect to the reciprocal tariff regime’s implementation that clearly sobered up the administration. That is until the boss begins to hit the bottle again. But that pause was not a one-size-fits-all. China was carved out and now finds itself with a 125 per cent increase under the banner of reciprocal tariffs.

The stock markets showed major movement to the upside as well with the “Wall Street Relief Rally” upon news of the pause. That rally at one point saw the market rise by 40,000-plus basis points. The reciprocal tariffs, though, could be reimposed for many countries who refuse to dance to the tune that the US president is now playing. They have not gone away. It’s almost akin to blackmail.

Is the Bermuda model still sustainable?

For Bermuda, most of our imports are sourced from the US. Such is the overall economic precariousness in which we find ourselves.

On the local level, the impact could represent a breaking point for even more households, with scores more emigrating to Britain and other locales out of quiet desperation.

The question is whether the Bermuda model is still sustainable. These Bermudians and other residents have been answering that question with their feet for more than a decade and a half. Clearly, for the estimated 8,000 residents who have relocated to Britain, if you read the recent Chamber of Commerce report — many of them Black — the answer is a big fat no. For those not on the international business plantation, Bermuda is already in irreversible decline. Eleven hundred are homeless as per the charity Home’s recent report.

To reap the bounty

It is clear to me that Bermuda must embrace change to its constitutional, political and economic model or be left behind. I just hope that it’s not too late. The recent General Election presented a golden opportunity to begin the process of renewal, and we blew it. The failed political status quo was re-established.

Trump and America are just getting started. We would be remiss if we think it is only an economic policy or a crisis of our financialised economies. At its heart, this is a geopolitical crisis first and foremost — America’s response to its decline as a global empire after the past 80 years. Not a pretty picture.

Those Western oligarchs and financial elites who are now crying holy murder, and who have been denouncing their former hero, Trump, have been and remain deeply complicit. It was these forces that financialised these economies decades ago, especially in the US and Britain.

They created the neoliberal world that outsourced and offshored the American manufacturing sector — leading to its deindustrialisation — most notably to China, which became the world’s workshop in the 1990s. The similar trend occurred in other parts of South East Asia and Mexico.

China is not insulated from harm to its economy, but it does hold some credible cards such as the tremendous amount of US debt it holds in the form of treasuries. It has in addition reduced its dependence on America as a major export market over the past decade precisely in anticipation of the coming of a day just like this while building its own Swift settlement platform. But one developed by the Bank of China for the 21st century that can process transactions within seconds for a fraction of the cost — a huge improvement on the three to five days associated with Swift.

This was also the world that midwifed Bermuda as a premier offshore financial centre during the mid to late 1980s, with the rentier class pouring in to reap the boundless bounty.

And the big winner is ...

As stated previously, what will be Bermuda's place in the new multipolar world that is emerging as the centre of global power recedes from the North Atlantic (Europe and North America)?

Bermuda needs to understand there are other threats emanating from Washington that could be on the cards, including the existential threat posed to our cargo lifeline. This could result with the imposition of substantive penalties of $1.5 million per visit being levied against all Chinese-produced vessels entering US ports, which the MV Oleander does every week. Apparently, this bizarre trade policy appears on hold.

I would not be surprised if a threat to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development’s global minimum tax regime emerges down the road. Trump already indicated some weeks ago that may also be in his sights, with the rationale being that he is opposed to American multinationals being taxed under that regime.

The only thing certain for the world at this point, as mentioned, is uncertainty.

The big winner in all of this, according to the Australian Warwick Powell, a well-known geopolitical analyst and adjunct professor at Queensland University, will be China. This despite the extraordinary imposition of even higher tariffs by the Trump Administration.

America is no longer the dominant trading partner in the world; China is. But the Brics bloc is also a winner, consisting as it does of mainly southern hemisphere countries where the growth in trade among and between the Global South has grown tremendously. This trend will accelerate. The Brics, featuring original members Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, will certainly see the demand for membership grow to another level as a direct consequence of this own goal by the United States.

• Rolfe Commissiong was the independent candidate for Pembroke Central (Constituency 17) in the 2025 General Election