Hard Numbers: Italian far-right soars, Chinese developers get help, Argentine minister sacked, Ukranians want war souvenirs

Hard Numbers: Italian far-right soars, Chinese developers get help, Argentine minister sacked, Ukranians want war souvenirs
From left to right, the leaders of Forza Italia (Silvio Berlusconi), Brothers of Italy (Giorgia Meloni), and Lega (Matteo Salvini) attend an anti-government rally in Rome.
Vandeville Eric/ABACA via Reuters Connect

40: A week after Italian PM Mario Draghi's official resignation, a far-right coalition is on track to win the Sept. 25 parliamentary election. A Politico Europe poll says the Brothers of Italy, Lega, and Forza Italia parties will together scoop up 40% of the vote.

148 billion: China's central bank wants to mobilize $148 billion to help banks issue low-interest loans to heavily indebted real-estate developers so they can finish countless unfinished projects nationwide. Some Chinese homebuyers recently stopped paying their mortgages on these unfinished projects.

26: Argentina’s Economy Minister Silvina Batakis is reportedly getting fired after only 26 days in office. The president and the VP are too busy fighting each other to come up with a solution to the country’s deepening economic crisis, including an ongoing run on the peso and sky-high inflation.

500: A Ukrainian computer programmer bought an empty missile tube used against a Russian armed personnel carrier for $500. The charity auction in Lviv put a spotlight on the perhaps macabre but very real rising demand for war souvenirs.

More from GZERO Media

Listen: On the GZERO World Podcast, we’re taking a look at some of the top geopolitical risks of 2025. This looks to be the year that the G-Zero wins. We’ve been living with this lack of international leadership for nearly a decade now. But in 2025, the problem will get a lot worse. We are heading back to the law of the jungle. A world where the strongest do what they can while the weakest are condemned to suffer what they must. Joining Ian Bremmer to peer into this cloudy crystal ball is renowned Stanford political scientist Francis Fukuyama.

President-elect Donald Trump appears remotely for a sentencing hearing in front of New York State Judge Juan Merchan in his hush money case at New York Criminal Court in New York City, on Jan. 10, 2025.
REUTERS/Brendan McDermid/Pool

President-elect Donald Trump was sentenced in his New York hush money case on Friday but received no punishment from Judge Juan M. Merchan, who issued an unconditional discharge with no jail time, probation, or fines

Paige Fusco

In a way, Donald Trump’s return means Putin has finally won. Not because of the silly notion that Trump is a “Russian agent” – but because it closes the door finally and fully on the era of post-Cold War triumphalist globalism that Putin encountered when he first came to power.

Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado greets supporters at a protest ahead of the Friday inauguration of President Nicolas Maduro for his third term, in Caracas, Venezuela January 9, 2025.
REUTERS/Leonardo Fernandez Viloria

Regime forces violently detained Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado as she left a rally in Caracas on Thursday, one day before strongman President Nicolás Maduro was set to begin his third term.

Paige Fusco

Justin Trudeau is leaving you, Donald Trump is coming for you. The timing couldn’t be worse. The threat couldn’t be bigger. The solutions couldn’t be more elusive, writes GZERO Publisher Evan Solomon.

- YouTube

Is international order on the precipice of collapse? 2025 is poised to be a turbulent year for the geopolitical landscape. From Canada and South Korea to Japan and Germany, the world faces a “deepening and rare absence of global leadership with more chaos than any time since the 1930s,” says Eurasia Group chairman Cliff Kupchan during a GZERO livestream to discuss the 2025 Top Risks report.

During the Munich Security Conference 2025, the BMW Foundation will again host the BMW Foundation Herbert Quandt Pavilion. From February 13th to 15th, we will organize panels, keynotes, and discussions focusing on achieving energy security and economic prosperity through innovation, policy, and global cooperation. The BMW Foundation emphasizes the importance of science-based approaches and believes that the energy transition can serve as a catalyst for economic opportunity, sustainability, and democratic resilience. Our aim is to facilitate solution-oriented dialogues between business, policy, science, and civil society to enhance Europe’s competitiveness in the energy and technology sectors, build a strong economy, and support a future-proof society. Read more about the BMW Foundation and our Pavilion at the Munich Security Conference here.