The Globe and Mail reports in its Tuesday edition that politics has led to global market volatility in recent weeks, with concerns about Europe, the U.S. and world trade. The Globe's guest columnists Laura Matthews and Tom Westbrook write that geopolitical concerns are driving money from potential conflict zones like Taiwan's stock market to safer assets like gold, which hit a record high last week. The line of thinking is that a period of peace and free trade is finished, and the next one looks less profitable. Nearly half the globe votes this year, and results so far underpin the shift in mood: Taiwan elected a president detested in Beijing, voters lurched to the right in France and installed the largest left-wing majority in Britain for a generation. In just eight days, Donald Trump narrowly avoided an assassination attempt and Joe Biden dropped out less than four months before polling day. Markets are tuning in and the news has pulled geopolitical concerns to the front of investors' minds. Neuberger Berman's Erik Knutzen says elevated geopolitical risks have him turning the "risk dial down." Goldman Sachs's cross-strait risk indicator, which analyzes news, is below peaks but has rebounded over the past week.