At the 2026 Bund Summit themed "Technology, Geopolitics and the Global Economy," held in Huangpu District, Shanghai, from October 19 to 22, 2026, He Dong, Chief Economist of the ASEAN+3 Macroeconomic Research Office, attended the conference and took part in a roundtable discussion. He Dong stated that the region studied by the ASEAN+3 Macroeconomic Research Office is currently at the core of the global artificial intelligence boom, which is mainly reflected in manufacturing investment and trade, but at the same time there is also considerable concentration risk.
He further pointed out that the investment boom will have spillover effects on manufacturing capacity at the overall level. Some economies have long been trapped in the so-called "middle-income trap," and many governments regard the artificial intelligence wave as an opportunity to boost domestic production capacity, which has also driven AI-related activities to expand into other sectors.
He Dong further looked ahead to Asia's trade prospects, arguing that Asia will remain highly open, and the internal cohesion of the "ASEAN+3" mechanism will also strengthen significantly. In the future, more vertical and horizontal trade flows will emerge within ASEAN, and foreign direct investment within ASEAN will provide strong support for such trade.
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