s<u+00c3>o paulo<u+2014>economist jim o<u+2019>neill, the creator of the bric acronym , isn<u+2019>t seeing the world turned upside down after the surprise election of donald trump. in an exclusive interview with the wall street journal late<u+00a0>thursday, the ex-goldman sachs group inc. executive said pundits predicting the end of globalization because a leader hostile to nafta and the proposed trans-pacific partnership will soon sit in the white house are missing the bigger picture. international trade isn<u+2019>t necessarily dependent on omnibus trade pacts , he said, while capital, people, goods and ideas will continue their inexorable flow across the globe. mr. o<u+2019>neill said it is too soon to predict how mr. trump will govern or how his agenda will shake out. still, he reckons that mr. trump<u+2019>s actions as president will likely to be more measured than his proclamations on the campaign trail, where the brash reality tv star threatened to slap punitive tariffs on goods from mexico and china. igniting a trade war that could end up damaging some of america<u+2019>s biggest corporate heavyweights <u+201c>is not logical,<u+201d> mr. o<u+2019>neill said. mr. trump <u+201c>will talk tough,<u+201d> but his policies won<u+2019>t turn out to <u+201c>be what people expect,<u+201d> mr. o<u+2019>neill said. mr. o<u+2019>neill said the u.s. and the rest of the world may well benefit from a change in perspective that the president-elect may bring, including a sharper focus on infrastructure and a review of monetary policy. <u+201c>we needed to think about something different,<u+201d> he said. mr. o<u+2019>neill, an englishman who coined the bric acronym in 2001 (later changed to brics for brazil, russia, india, china and south africa) left goldman sachs in 2013. he was appointed commercial secretary to the u.k. treasury in 2015, a post he resigned in september, a few months after u.k. citizens voted to leave the european union. while pundits have seized on the surprise victories of both brexit and mr. trump as referendums on globalization, mr. o<u+2019>neill, an expert in international economics, disputes that interpretation. <u+201c>i think this current populist view that globalization is in crisis and over, i think it is very naive,<u+201d> he said. <u+201c>it is almost embarrassing.<u+201d> stocks and currencies in emerging markets tumbled following mr. trump<u+2019>s nov. 8 victory. the real-estate mogul has promised a massive expansion in public works to create jobs and boost the u.s. economy. that has many analysts and economists predicting faster u.s. gdp growth, higher inflation and higher interest rates, expectations that have sent the stock market soaring and the dollar higher. but mr. o<u+2019>neill said the dollar<u+2019>s surge can<u+2019>t last forever, and that the developing economies can still thrive in the new environment. he pointed to china, which has begun shifting from an export-led economic model to a consumption model and is still maintaining robust growth despite a slowdown from the boom years. <u+201c>china<u+2019>s growth is still the envy of every country in the world other than india,<u+201d> mr. o<u+00b4>neill said. china<u+2019>s gdp is projected to expand by more than 6% in 2016. as for the other brics, he believes possible strengthening in commodity prices could help countries such as brazil and russia, while the latter could benefit from an improved relationship with the u.s. mr. trump has expressed admiration for russian president vladimir putin, whose annexation of the crimea has resulted in global condemnation and tough economic sanctions from the u.s. and other western nations. whether mr. trump<u+2019>s election can reset the u.s.-russian relationship and lead to easing of those sanctions remains to be seen. ultimately <u+201c>the bric<u+2019>s future depends on themselves, not on trump,<u+201d> mr. o<u+2019>neill said. write to luciana magalhaes at luciana.magalhaes@wsj.com
economist jim o<u+2019>neill says donald trump<u+2019>s election won<u+2019>t stop globalization  - wsj
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