🛢 Energy & Commodities risk-off · 6–18 months
A what‑if from the future

What if China escalates rare-earth export controls and chokes magnet supply?

China escalates rare-earth and processing-tech export controls (beyond gallium/germanium/graphite), choking magnet supply for EVs, wind and defense and spiking ex-China prices, a trade-security shock.

15%
our model probability
over 6–18 months
prediction markets — wisdom of the crowd
loading live odds…
Empirically anchored 15% · 90% range 0–31% · 40 analogues · measured class supply_chain 26% in 18 mo · 3% held back for the unknown
how we built this number — every step
Measured class rate — supply_chain ≈0.2052/yr → 26% in 18 mo26%
Analyst prior · editorial share 60% of the class16%
Pooled · weight 87%16%
Crowd — no liquid market
Reserve 3% · no extremizing (×1.0)16%
Published15%

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 6–18 months 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 risk-off shock. China escalates rare-earth and processing-tech export controls (beyond gallium/germanium/graphite), choking magnet supply for EVs, wind and defense and spiking ex-China prices, a trade-security shock. The trigger decomposes into signed root‑shocks — Geopolitical risk ▲ · Industrial demand ▲ · Semiconductor supply risk ▲ · 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
1Volatility (VIX) VIXon Hyperliquid 📈 chartVol▲ +6.4%
hist +0.75–+7.09% · other way -5.62% (n=12)
2Nasdaq 100 NDXon Hyperliquid 📈 chartIndex▼ -4.0%
hist -2.35–-1.1% · other way +0.53% (n=12)
3Semiconductors SMHon Hyperliquid 📈 chartEquity▼ -3.0%
hist -2.29–-0.81% · other way +1.05% (n=12)
4TSMC TSMon Hyperliquid 📈 chartEquity▼ -2.8%
hist -3.48–-0.11% · other way -0.33% (n=12)
5Nvidia NVDAon Hyperliquid 📈 chartEquity▼ -2.7%
hist -1.91–-0.69% · other way +7.28% (n=12)
6Tech sector XLK 📈 chartEquity▼ -2.8%
hist -1.86–-1.0% · other way +0.9% (n=12)
7ASML ASMLon Hyperliquid 📈 chartEquity▼ -2.0%
hist -3.84–+0.54% · other way -3.44% (n=12)
8AMD AMDon Hyperliquid 📈 chartEquity▼ -2.0%
hist -1.94–+0.77% · other way -1.73% (n=12)
9Broadcom AVGOon Hyperliquid 📈 chartEquity▼ -2.0%
hist -1.46–-0.32% · other way +1.15% (n=12)
10Micron MUon Hyperliquid 📈 chartEquity▼ -2.0%
hist -2.16–-0.31% · other way -6.54% (n=12)
11Marvell MRVLon Hyperliquid 📈 chartEquity▼ -2.0%
hist -1.65–-0.53% · other way +0.08% (n=12)
12Qualcomm QCOMon Hyperliquid 📈 chartEquity▼ -1.4%
hist -4.78–+0.8% · other way -3.18% (n=12)
13S&P 500 SPXon Hyperliquid 📈 chartIndex▼ -1.4%
hist -1.33–-0.26% · other way +1.65% (n=12)
14Alibaba BABAon Hyperliquid 📈 chartEquity▼ -1.1%
hist -0.74–-0.37% · other way -2.76% (n=11)

Probable recommendation

If the scenario above plays out, the probable cross‑asset positioning → a scenario‑conditional read, not personalized investment advice
Cash / hedgeRaise cash and hold the long hedges above; this scenario is net risk-off.
For a common-man portfolio: A typical stock-heavy portfolio is at risk. Consider trimming equities, raising cash, and a small gold hedge.
Also moves (not yet on Hyperliquid): Tech sector -2.8% · Chinese yuan -0.9% · High-yield credit -0.7% · Aussie dollar -0.5% · Financials -0.5% · Lockheed +0.5%

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.

Gold tops $3,000 for the first time amid tariff and rate-cut fears 2025-03 China retaliates to Liberation Day: 34% tariffs + rare-earth controls 2025-04 Chinese yuan breaks 7 per dollar; US names China manipulator 2019-08 North Korea sixth nuclear test 2017-09 North Korea 'fire and fury' nuclear scare 2017-08 Egyptian revolution / Mubarak uprising 2011-01 Soviet August coup attempt against Gorbachev 1991-08 Gold peaks at $850 1980-01 Iran hostage crisis / US freezes Iranian assets 1979-11 Smoot-Hawley clears the US House 1929-05 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 Israel strikes Iran — Operation Rising Lion 2025-06 US and China agree Geneva tariff truce, slashing rates 2025-05 TSMC slumps as DeepSeek roils AI-chip demand assumptions 2025-02 Micron's weak FQ2 guidance sparks a sharp December selloff 2024-12 ASML bookings-miss crash 2024-10 October 2024 Iranian ballistic-missile attack on Israel 2024-10 Gold tops $2,500 for the first time on Fed rate-cut bets 2024-08 Megacap AI-capex doubt selloff 2024-07 India slashes gold import duty from 15% to 6% in 2024 budget 2024-07 Trump 'Taiwan should pay for defense' chip selloff 2024-07 Niger coup d'etat 2023-07 Wagner Group mutiny against the Kremlin 2023-06 Netflix subscriber-loss crash 2022-04 Tin hits nominal record on LME above $48,000/t 2022-03 Meta 2022-02 Burkina Faso coup d'etat 2022-01 Didi removed from China app stores after NYSE IPO 2021-07 Mali coup d'etat 2020-08 Gold closes above $2,000/oz for the first time 2020-08 Saudi-Russia oil price war 2020-03 Huawei added to Entity List + ICT executive order 2019-05 Nvidia crypto-glut guidance crash 2018-11 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 Mexican peso crash on Trump 2016 win 2016-11
AssetHistory saysAbnormal (20d · 5d)HitnConfidencevs cascade
ETH ETHSHORT-4.7% · 5d -5.5%68%32 0.29✓ matches cascade
KWEB KWEBSHORT-2.1% · 5d -2.0%66%35 0.25✓ matches cascade
INTC INTCSHORT-4.0% · 5d -2.1%62%37 0.24✓ matches cascade
QCOM QCOMSHORT-3.7% · 5d -3.4%65%36 0.22✓ matches cascade
TRY TRYSHORT-0.8% · 5d +0.5% ↺ fades63%36 0.20✓ matches cascade
XCU XCUSHORT-0.9% · 5d -0.8%62%36 0.20✓ matches cascade
CNY CNYSHORT-0.4% · 5d -0.2%59%36 0.18✓ matches cascade
Bitcoin BTCSHORT-3.2% · 5d -3.4%61%35 0.17✓ matches cascade
NDX NDXSHORT-0.3% · 5d -1.3%61%37 0.15✓ matches cascade
Gold XAULONG+0.7% · 5d -0.9% ↺ fades58%36 0.14✓ matches cascade
EURUSD EURUSDLONG+0.0% · 5d +0.0%59%36 0.14⚠ differs
TSM TSMSHORT-1.9% · 5d -2.5%58%36 0.13✓ matches cascade
SOL SOLSHORT-3.7% · 5d -7.4%59%24 0.12✓ matches cascade
KRW KRWLONG+0.1% · 5d -0.3% ↺ fades57%36 0.12⚠ differs

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.