The US: Harris vs Houdini

Also: China, France, Sudan, Ethiopia, and Somalia.

Man ascending a coconut palm, J Shury after James Forbes, 1768, engraving, Wellcome Collection, London.

In today’s dispatch:

• UNITED STATES. Trump’s campaign looks doomed, but so it did in 2016.

• UNITED STATES. CHINA. The dollar dominates trade, but alternatives are growing.

• FRANCE. Macron returns to a full in-tray.

• SUDAN. Peace talks proceed without the main party present.

• ETHIOPIA. SOMALIA. Addis opts for talks over confrontation on Somaliland.

Geopolitical Dispatch is the daily intelligence and risk briefing of Geopolitical Strategy, an advisory firm specialising exclusively in geopolitical risk.

UNITED STATES. Harris vs Houdini

Trump’s campaign looks doomed but so it did in 2016.

A Twitter interview between Donald Trump and Elon Musk crashed Monday night as betting markets pushed the odds of Kamala Harris winning to 60%. Polls indicated a majority of voters, including in three swing states, favoured Harris.

INTELLIGENCE. Harris’s honeymoon looks set to continue into next week’s Democratic National Convention. Yet Hillary Clinton seemed to have an even greater chance at victory, right through to election day. Trump’s ability to flip the narrative, and move the debate to policy, should not be discounted. Harris’s key hope will be that Trump has learnt the wrong lesson from 2016 and will continue to campaign on personality – an approach more voters are inured to.

FOR BUSINESS. Republican strategists will want Trump to change tack, but whether he listens is another thing. There will be plenty of Democratic policy weaknesses to exploit in the months ahead, especially if the Middle East continues to deteriorate, border pressures return, and last week's Wall Street selloff resumes. But recent economic data has been broadly encouraging and, according to a Michigan Ross poll, more Americans now trust Harris on the economy.

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UNITED STATES. CHINA. Yuaning gap

The dollar dominates trade, but alternatives are growing.

The Shanghai Cooperation Organizations has created an "Alliance of Currency Transactions" involving the yuan, the ruble and Kazakhstan's tenge, regional media said. Russia last week legalised the use of bitcoin in international trade.

INTELLIGENCE. The US dollar has fallen to 58% of global reserves, according to the Atlantic Council, down from 72% in 2002, but the greenback still