The global economy is facing rifts comparable to the pressures that resulted in “economic nationalism”, a collapse in global trade and the Great Depression of the 1920s, the president of the European Central Bank has warned.

“We have faced the worst pandemic since the 1920s, the worst conflict in Europe since the 1940s and the worst energy shock since the 1970s,” said Christine Lagarde on Friday, adding that these disruptions combined with factors such as supply chain problems had permanently changed global economic activity.

In a speech at the IMF in Washington two days after the Federal Reserve cut interest rates by 50 basis points, pushing US equity markets to record highs, the ECB president argued that several parallels “between the “two twenties — the 1920s and 2020s — stand out”, pointing to “setbacks in global trade integration” and technological advances in both eras.