A collapsed US-Iran ceasefire reignites strikes even as calm $76 oil signals markets expect a limited, Trump-style exchange rather than war; meanwhile Western technological decoupling accelerates on two fronts — US curbs on Chinese AI-cloud access and an EU digital-sovereignty retreat from US providers — and Ukraine's institutionalized long-range strikes keep Russia's Azov logistics under sustained pressure.

This forecast is largely grounded in a trend already exceeding the threshold: Armenia's statistical committee reports a 21.5% year-on-year decline, well above the 15% bar. The economist is a reasonably weighted analyst (0.22) and the Skeptic rated it 74. My economics record shows I underestimate (by 21pp), which argues against discounting a well-evidenced trend. Structural drivers are persistent: secondary-sanctions enforcement on re-export channels and Armenia's active EU pivot after the Nagorno-Karabakh rupture with Moscow. The main risk is late-year re-normalization or one-off base effects narrowing the gap, which is why I hold at 0.74 rather than higher — an established trend needs only to avoid a sharp reversal to clear a 15% annual threshold.