Welcome back to the Global Month Ahead, Global Counsel's briefing on the events and stories that will define the month to come. In each episode, Global Macro Associate Director Isabelle Trick will hear from different members of the GC team to preview the month's stories before they are in the headlines.

This month:

• What's next for tackling the EU energy crisis? Europe's reliance on Russian gas has created a crisis that will only escalate in the winter; Senior Associate Jasbir Basi takes us inside the policy debates at this month's emergency negotiations among EU countries and Associate Director Anikó Zsebik breaks down the widening rift between European leaders on how to address the crisis.
• A pivotal month for two BRIC countries. This past Sunday, a deeply polarised Brazil held the first round of its Presidential elections. As expected, the runoff later this month will come down to right-wing incumbent Jair Bolsonaro and leftist leader Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva; Associate Sonia Vasconcellos explains how the tighter-than-expected race will test Brazil's fragile democratic institutions. Meanwhile, China is holding its National Congress late this month, where Xi Jinping is all but guaranteed to secure a third term leading the Chinese Communist Party. Associate Director Jens Presthus cuts through the palace intrigue to give us his expectations for the meeting and the changes coming to the Party leadership.
• Amid brutal economic headwinds, the IMF and World Bank converge on DC. The annual late-October meeting of the World Bank and International Monetary Funds comes in the shadow of fears of a global recession. Senior Practice Director Thomas Gratowski previews which events we should be following during the meeting, and how overlapping crises in Europe, the UK, the US and China could create an economic crisis on a scale not seen in decades.