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Trade without AI – What happens if the boom fades?

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It is almost impossible to talk about the trade outlook these days without talking about AI. Today, AI-enabling goods (as defined by the World Trade Organization) account for nearly 20% of global goods trade, up from 14% on average in 2024.

Trade in these products accounted for more than 40% of annual global trade growth last year and, by our estimates, around 80% of y-o-y export growth in Q1 2026 alone in nominal terms.

There is no region where AI matters more for exports than Asia, where many economies are benefiting from the boom. Together, mainland China (18%), Taiwan (14%) and Hong Kong (12%) represented 44% of total global AI-related exports in the first quarter of 2026 in value terms.

Today, around 80% of Taiwan’s total exports and 27% of US imports are related to the AI value chain. The share of AI-enabling goods in total US imports has nearly doubled since the beginning of 2025 mostly due to soaring component prices. For comparison, the value of US AI imports was up 60% y-o-y in the first five months of this year, while volumes were up just 8%.

The AI boom is not only supporting goods trade, but cross-border services flows, too. Exports of digitally delivered services (e.g. cloud computing services, financial services, other business services) grew 10% y-o-y in 2025, and now accounts for 55% (USD5.3trn) of total global services exports.

But what if the AI boom starts to fade? In its June 2026 Annual Economic Report, the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) noted that previous investment booms – for example around “canal mania” of the 1830s and the dotcom boom of the late 1990s – all ended with an eventual reversal in investment and induced economy-wide recessions. Given the scale and pace of current tech investments, the BIS argues there is a risk that today’s AI boom could follow a similar path.

For economies that are highly dependent on AI exports, a dissipating boom would have implications for trade growth. We estimate that if Taiwan’s and Korea’s export growth forecasts were halved this year and next, around 0.2-0.3ppt could be shaved off global export growth each year. If mainland China’s export engine were to slow the aggregate impact could be larger still, given the economy’s weight in global trade.

But this is not our base case. The good news for trade is that investment in AI is anticipated to stay strong in the coming years, which will buoy demand for AI-related components. Around 40% of data centres are located in the US and HSBC’s technology analysts forecast that the combined AI investment of the top six hyperscalers (companies building and running data centres) could exceed USD1trn in 2027.

Therefore, all things considered, we expect trade to continue riding the AI boom for a while longer.

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