🛢 Energy & Commodities mixed · 1–3 years
A what‑if from the future

What if China's overcapacity floods global aluminium and nickel markets?

China's overcapacity and weak demand flood global aluminium and nickel markets, crushing prices and the margins of Western and Indonesian producers.

14%
our model probability
over 1–3 years
prediction markets — wisdom of the crowd
loading live odds…
Empirically anchored 14% · 90% range 6–24% · 40 analogues · measured class trade_war 98% in 3 yr · 3% held back for the unknown
how we built this number — every step
Measured class rate — trade_war ≈1.3449/yr → 98% in 3 yr98%
Analyst prior · editorial share 14% of the class14%
Pooled · weight 87%15%
Crowd — no liquid market
Reserve 3% · no extremizing (×1.0)15%
Published14%

The class rate is measured from our dated, sourced event library (decade-normalized Poisson — the full table is public at base_rates.json). The variant’s share within its class is the analyst’s editorial call, published so you can audit it. A wider range means thinner precedent. Full recipe: methodology · scored at Reality Check.

The butterfly cascade

How this trigger trickles across markets, left → right — the root shock, its first‑order moves, then the ripple effects. Drag any node; tap a market for its real price history.

Resolution timeline — how this probability is moving

Our model's odds (gold) over time vs the crowd's (Polymarket, blue), from the past toward the 1–3 years horizon. Each dot is a real macro event that nudged the probability — green pushed it up, red pushed it down. Tap a dot for the source. The gold path is an illustrative reconstruction anchored to today's estimate — real dated events, not a live re-estimate history.

loading the timeline…

What it would mean

If this plays out, it is a mixed shock. China's overcapacity and weak demand flood global aluminium and nickel markets, crushing prices and the margins of Western and Indonesian producers. The trigger decomposes into signed root‑shocks — Copper ▼ · China growth ▼ · Industrial demand ▼ · Trade tension ▲ — which propagate through our causal graph to the markets below.

If it happens — the markets it would move

Biggest moves first. Projected moves are cascade-model priors; hist A–B% = what comparable past events actually did (measured abnormal returns), and model prior · unmeasured marks markets with no analogue backing yet. Tap any market for its price history.

MarketClassProjected move
1Freeport (copper) FCX 📈 chartEquity▼ -1.4%
hist -6.29–+1.37% · other way +8.32% (n=11)
2Copper XCUon Hyperliquid 📈 chartCommodity▼ -1.1%
hist -2.28–+0.19% · other way -0.19% (n=11)
3Alibaba BABAon Hyperliquid 📈 chartEquity▼ -0.9%
hist -1.65–+0.17% · other way -5.17% (n=8)
4Semiconductors SMHon Hyperliquid 📈 chartEquity▼ -0.8%
hist -0.93–-0.1% · other way +2.75% (n=11)
5Nasdaq 100 NDXon Hyperliquid 📈 chartIndex▼ -0.8%
hist -0.54–-0.28% · other way +1.81% (n=11)
6Nvidia NVDAon Hyperliquid 📈 chartEquity▼ -0.7%
hist -2.03–+0.32% · other way +10.49% (n=11)
7TSMC TSMon Hyperliquid 📈 chartEquity▼ -0.7%
hist -1.07–+0.08% · other way +4.87% (n=11)
8Chinese yuan CNY 📈 chartFX▼ -0.6%
hist -0.56–-0.1% · other way -0.17% (n=10)
9China internet KWEBon Hyperliquid 📈 chartEquity▼ -0.5%
hist -3.27–+0.62% · other way -1.46% (n=8)
10Tech sector XLK 📈 chartEquity▼ -0.6%
hist -0.41–-0.06% · other way +2.57% (n=11)
11AMD AMDon Hyperliquid 📈 chartEquity▼ -0.5%
hist -1.83–+0.42% · other way +7.06% (n=11)
12Broadcom AVGOon Hyperliquid 📈 chartEquity▼ -0.5%
hist -0.56–+0.3% · other way +2.05% (n=9)
13Micron MUon Hyperliquid 📈 chartEquity▼ -0.5%
hist -2.6–+0.78% · other way +7.93% (n=11)
14Marvell MRVLon Hyperliquid 📈 chartEquity▼ -0.5%
hist -1.21–+0.24% · other way +12.35% (n=11)

Probable recommendation

If the scenario above plays out, the probable cross‑asset positioning → a scenario‑conditional read, not personalized investment advice
For a common-man portfolio: Mixed for a typical portfolio — the move is more about rotation than direction. Favour the winners over the losers below rather than net exposure.
Also moves (not yet on Hyperliquid): Freeport (copper) -1.4% · Chinese yuan -0.6% · Tech sector -0.6% · Aussie dollar -0.4% · Turkish lira -0.2% · Indian rupee -0.2%

Historical precedent — what analogous events actually did

Across 40 analogous events (overlap‑weighted), as abnormal returns — market beta stripped, so it's the event's own effect, not the market backdrop. Shown at 20 days (persistent) and 5 days (immediate); ↺ fades = the two horizons disagree. Confidence = consistency × sample × significance.

China retaliates to Liberation Day: 34% tariffs + rare-earth controls 2025-04 Gold tops $3,000 for the first time amid tariff and rate-cut fears 2025-03 Chinese yuan breaks 7 per dollar; US names China manipulator 2019-08 Record $19bn crypto liquidation cascade 2025-10 Gold tops $4,000 and silver spikes past $50 in historic squeeze 2025-10 US-China extend tariff truce by another 90 days 2025-08 Trump's 50% copper tariff sends Comex copper to a record 2025-07 US and China agree Geneva tariff truce, slashing rates 2025-05 ASML bookings-miss crash 2024-10 Gold tops $2,500 for the first time on Fed rate-cut bets 2024-08 India slashes gold import duty from 15% to 6% in 2024 budget 2024-07 Offshore yuan hits a record low 2022-11 China fires ballistic missiles into Japan's EEZ during Taiwan drills 2022-08 Alibaba upsizes buyback to record $25 billion 2022-03 Kaisa Group offshore default 2021-12 Evergrande debt crisis - global selloff 2021-09 Didi removed from China app stores after NYSE IPO 2021-07 Bitcoin May 2021 crash 2021-05 Copper tops $10,000 a tonne for the first time since 2011 2021-04 Gold closes above $2,000/oz for the first time 2020-08 Apple cuts revenue guidance on China weakness 2019-01 US List 3 tariffs on $200B of Chinese goods finalized 2018-09 US Section 301 List 1 tariffs take effect on China 2018-07 China retaliates: $50B tariff list incl. soybeans 2018-04 US Section 232 steel & aluminum tariffs imposed 2018-03 North Korea sixth nuclear test 2017-09 North Korea 'fire and fury' nuclear scare 2017-08 Mexican peso crash on Trump 2016 win 2016-11 China stock-market circuit-breaker fiasco 2016-01 August 24, 2015 ETF flash crash 2015-08 China's PBOC reveals 57% jump in gold reserves after six-year silence 2015-07 Shanghai A-share bubble peak / crash begins 2015-06 Gold futures velocity-logic flash crash 2014-01 Gold all-time peak of $1,921/oz 2011-09 Egyptian revolution / Mubarak uprising 2011-01 Copper crashes to ~$1.30/lb as 2008 crisis crushes China demand 2008-12 China 4 trillion yuan stimulus 2008-11 October 27, 1997 mini-crash 1997-10 Asian financial crisis - Thai baht float 1997-07 Soviet August coup attempt against Gorbachev 1991-08
AssetHistory saysAbnormal (20d · 5d)HitnConfidencevs cascade
INTC INTCSHORT-2.9% · 5d -1.7%71%40 0.36✓ matches cascade
XPT XPTSHORT-0.5% · 5d +0.6% ↺ fades68%37 0.30✓ matches cascade
KWEB KWEBSHORT-2.7% · 5d -2.1%67%33 0.29✓ matches cascade
TRY TRYSHORT-1.2% · 5d -0.1%69%37 0.29✓ matches cascade
XCU XCUSHORT-1.6% · 5d -0.8%66%37 0.28✓ matches cascade
FCX FCXSHORT-5.1% · 5d -1.9%62%39 0.21✓ matches cascade
QCOM QCOMSHORT-3.1% · 5d -2.8%64%39 0.21✓ matches cascade
NVDA NVDASHORT-1.5% · 5d -3.1%62%37 0.18✓ matches cascade
AMD AMDSHORT-1.4% · 5d -1.4%58%40 0.13✓ matches cascade
Bitcoin BTCSHORT-4.2% · 5d -3.9%58%32 0.13·
High-yield credit HYGSHORT-0.4% · 5d -0.1%58%37 0.13·
BABA BABASHORT-1.1% · 5d -3.1%57%32 0.12✓ matches cascade
CNY CNYSHORT-0.2% · 5d -0.1%56%37 0.11✓ matches cascade
AUD AUDSHORT-0.6% · 5d -0.3%57%37 0.11✓ matches cascade

Methodology. Probability and impact are anchored to history and scored against what actually happens — wins and losses, in public, at Reality Check. Crowd odds live from Polymarket & Kalshi. By Vikas Singh, Quantitative Strategist. Updated 2026-07-03.