19 August 2026 – Trex today publishes a new client briefing on the super El Niño currently forming in the Pacific, warning that its economic impact should be understood as a near-term shock rather than a gradual trend, with a modelled peak of €4.1 trillion in lost global GDP. The briefing, produced using Trex's Tipping Point Scenarios (TPS) Climate platform, models the expected economic impact to sectors and regions from a Super El Nino event.

A Shock, Not a Slow Burn

Early indicators suggest the event now forming has the potential to become one of the strongest El Niños on record. A super El Niño doesn't behave like the steady warming trends typically captured in climate scenario analysis – it's a spike, capable of adding up to 0.25°C of additional warming within a single year. The 1997/98 event cost Indonesia an estimated $10 billion; the 2015/16 event cut food production by up to 66% in parts of Southern Africa.

Willemijn Verdegaal, Co-Founder and Chief Commercial & Strategy Officer at Trex said, "The window for firms to understand their exposure isn't after the event peaks in 2027, it's now. That is the gap this briefing is designed to close."

Where the Risk Concentrates

Trex's modelling points to a peak annual global GDP loss of €4.1 trillion, with Indonesia alone facing a GDP hit of around 4% at the height of the shock. Exposure varies sharply by geography: the same event can intensify drought across Australia, Southern Africa and the Amazon, while driving flooding across western South America and the southern United States. Two portfolios with similar sector exposure can carry very different risk depending on where their underlying assets and supply chains sit.

Built on Trex TPS Climate

The briefing draws on Trex TPS Climate, which combines non-linear hazard and transition modelling, delivered through Trex's exclusive partnership with Cambridge Econometrics and its E3ME model. Featuring both macro-economic and asset-level data, capturing compounding shocks and tipping points for near-term, actionable insights for investors.

Willemijn Verdegaal added, "Regulators have already flagged that traditional models understate this kind of risk. For firms making capital allocation, lending and investment decisions, understanding exposure to a shock like this is not a long-horizon question, it's immediate."

Download the full briefing now – and contact Trex if you want to see how your portfolio is exposed ahead of the expected 2027 peak.

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About Trex

Trex is a commercial spin out from the University of Exeter. Trex Climate is our inaugural capability, focused on energy transition dynamics and extreme weather hazards. It models plausible, extreme and baseline scenarios, generating more than 1 billion data points and capturing non-linear feedbacks and tipping points. It identifies both threats and opportunities to support lending, investment, insurance and corporate planning decisions over the short to medium term. https://trexanalysis.com/

About Cambridge Econometrics  

Cambridge Econometrics is an independent global economics consultancy that helps organisations make informed strategic and policy decisions by providing clear, actionable insights through the effective use of evidence. Through our peer-reviewed and NGFS recognised macroeconomic model E3ME, our climate scenario analysis experts support the finance sector by simulating the interactions and dynamics of the economy, testing the impact of different global temperature pathways, and quantifying the impacts of physical and transitional climate risks.  https://www.camecon.com/