Dark economic clouds that have shrouded global markets for the past several years are beginning to dissipate, according to two leading economists who spoke to business leaders in Bermuda yesterday.And the improving forecast provides opportunities for investors, although some economic headwinds will continue to be a factor in the near term.The US economy in particular is showing encouraging signs in the eyes of both Henk Potts and Ryan Wang.Mr Potts is the director of global investment strategy at Barclays, while Mr Wang is HSBC’s US economist. The two men spoke on the topic of global markets outlook on the final day of the Bermuda Captive Conference at the Fairmont Southampton.Mr Potts identified the dark economic clouds as the European sovereign debt crisis, the US fiscal cliff and debt ceiling and the slowing down of growth in some emerging markets.“A pickup in decisive action from politicians, and perhaps more notably from central bankers, has allowed some of those dark clouds to dissipate and for investors to see through them to the cheap evaluation horizon, hence we’ve seen a good performance from risky assets over the course of the past year or so,” he said.Barclays coined the phrase “muddle though” to describe ongoing efforts to deal with the Eurozone’s sovereign debt crisis, Mr Potts said. He explained: “That’s the way politicians have faced up to the crisis, never really letting the situation deteriorate into catastrophe, but at the same time never taking those bold steps to deliver a definitive solution.”He said the battle to solve the euro zone sovereign debt crisis continues and while the war hasn’t been won he feels there have been some victories. The “real game changer” has been the European Central Bank, according to Mr Potts. He said it had effectively acted as a backstop for the euro zone through a one trillion refinancing operation and outright monetary transactions, “calming market nerves and giving politicians the time they require to introduce structural reform”. He cautioned there were still big challenges for the euro zone and, in a timeline of how these would play out, suggested a lasting solution would likely not be in place until 2022. Looking at the US, he described the world’s biggest economy as being in steady recovery but still impacted by the weaker economic market conditions and domestic challenges.Pointing to improving retail sales and property prices, as well as employment figures rising at a rate of around 155,000 per month, Mr Potts believes the Federal Reserve’s quantitative easing stimulation programme can now be steadily reduced.He felt the major emerging economies of China, India and Brazil will continue to enjoy plenty of economic growth, albeit at a slower rate than has been seen in the past. China will also move towards becoming a domestic market powerhouse, possibly eclipsing the US as the world’s number one economy as soon as 2018.For investment opportunities, Mr Potts said the equities markets will continue to outperform over the next few years, adding: “We believe that 2013 will be the ‘year of the deal’ and that is something investors can take advantage of.”He suggested investors exercise caution regarding government bonds and gold, and forecast the US dollar will strengthen as it becomes more of an investment currency.During his segment of the discussion HSBC’s Mr Wang focused primarily on the US economy and described economic data as presenting a mixed picture.He said the country’s GDP growth had been stuck in a range between 1.5 percent and 2.5 percent for a number of years consistent but “not great”. The housing market has improved but consumer spending was still sluggish, and while the service sector is enjoying an uptick, manufacturing is “treading water”.Like Mr Potts earlier in the session, Mr Wang cited weakness in the global economic market as a factor dragging on the US economy, he also noted the effect of government cutbacks in spending and workforce reductions as a further drag factor.“Acceleration of growth hasn’t happened yet. We think that next year GDP growth will be about 2.5 percent,” he said.What could accelerate growth would be the improving housing market feeding into consumer confidence and making households feel more comfortable and prepared to spend more money and save less, said Mr Wang.He also believes the Fed is concerned about the cost of quantitative easing and how much it is expanding its balance sheet, while also being worried about any unintentional effects on the market from reducing the level of QE. Mr Wang said: “The people who are more worried will point to the volatility in financial markets in the past three weeks and say ‘Look, we told you so. Markets have got so concerned about the slightest reduction in quantitative easing this must be proof that you’re doing too much and if you keep going it’s just going to just produce a bigger disaster in the future’. I expect that some part of that discussion is taking place in the Federal Reserve now and for the rest of this year.”Mr Wang believes the Fed would be more comfortable if it could reduce the quantitative easing from the current $85 billion a month to around $55 billion a month. He concurred with fellow speaker Mr Potts that the Fed would begin tapering QE at the end of this year or the beginning of 2014.The three-day Bermuda Captive Conference, which attracted around 600 attendees, concluded yesterday.