What if China halted its rare-earth and gallium exports?
A China rare-earth/gallium/germanium halt is the asymmetric retaliation: China dominates refining, so the supply shock hits the entire semi/defense magnet chain that cannot re-source quickly, dragging TSMC and the Nasdaq while the yuan slips. Direct rhyme is the Apr-2025 rare-earth controls bundled with 34% tariffs, and the 2010 China-Japan REE embargo that spiked prices for a year. Forward angle: ex-China processing (MP Materials, Lynas) is the structural long here — the embargo is the catalyst that finally prices Western supply security.
how we built this number — every step
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.
What it would mean
If this plays out, it is a risk-off shock. China retaliates by halting rare-earth and gallium/germanium exports. The trigger decomposes into signed root‑shocks — Trade tension ▲ · Semiconductor supply risk ▲ — 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.
| Market | Class | Projected move | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | TSMC TSMon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -2.8% hist -1.93–-0.92% · other way +1.64% (n=12) |
| 2 | Semiconductors SMHon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -2.7% hist -1.57–-0.65% · other way +1.4% (n=12) |
| 3 | Nvidia NVDAon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -2.7% hist -1.81–-0.66% · other way +4.13% (n=12) |
| 4 | Nasdaq 100 NDXon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Index | ▼ -2.4% hist -1.57–-0.47% · other way -0.05% (n=12) |
| 5 | ASML ASMLon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -1.9% hist -4.11–+0.75% · other way -0.91% (n=12) |
| 6 | AMD AMDon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -1.8% hist -1.55–+0.31% · other way -2.72% (n=12) |
| 7 | Broadcom AVGOon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -1.8% hist -1.34–+1.33% · other way +5.76% (n=12) |
| 8 | Micron MUon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -1.8% hist -3.34–+0.25% · other way -1.7% (n=12) |
| 9 | Marvell MRVLon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -1.8% hist -1.35–+0.48% · other way -0.28% (n=12) |
| 10 | Alibaba BABAon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -1.5% hist -0.99–-0.52% · other way -0.79% (n=12) |
| 11 | Tech sector XLK 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -1.6% hist -1.0–-0.56% · other way +0.37% (n=12) |
| 12 | Qualcomm QCOMon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -1.3% hist -3.58–+0.72% · other way -3.2% (n=12) |
| 13 | Chinese yuan CNY 📈 chart | FX | ▼ -1.1% hist -0.93–-0.23% · other way +-0.0% (n=12) |
| 14 | Intel INTCon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -1.0% hist -6.86–+1.2% · other way -2.6% (n=12) |
Probable recommendation
Why we may diverge from history
Trust the cascade on USDJPY/DXY: the historical negatives are 2024-25 tech-selloff windows driven by yen-haven and US-fear dollar weakness; a rare-earth/gallium export halt is a supply-side risk-off shock that bids the dollar differently.
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.
| Asset | History says | Abnormal (20d · 5d) | Hit | n | Confidence | vs cascade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ETH ETH | SHORT | -8.4% · 5d -5.8% | 76% | 38 | 0.41 | ✓ matches cascade |
| INTC INTC | SHORT | -5.6% · 5d -3.7% | 67% | 39 | 0.34 | ✓ matches cascade |
| KRW KRW | LONG | +0.6% · 5d -0.0% ↺ fades | 67% | 39 | 0.30 | ⚠ differs |
| KWEB KWEB | SHORT | -2.6% · 5d -1.2% | 67% | 39 | 0.29 | ✓ matches cascade |
| Gold XAU | LONG | +1.3% · 5d -0.1% ↺ fades | 67% | 39 | 0.29 | · |
| SOL SOL | SHORT | -8.8% · 5d -6.5% | 70% | 36 | 0.27 | ✓ matches cascade |
| FCX FCX | SHORT | -1.8% · 5d -1.9% | 65% | 39 | 0.25 | ✓ matches cascade |
| XCU XCU | SHORT | -0.8% · 5d -0.8% | 65% | 39 | 0.25 | ✓ matches cascade |
| NDX NDX | SHORT | -0.5% · 5d -1.4% | 67% | 39 | 0.24 | ✓ matches cascade |
| TRY TRY | SHORT | -1.6% · 5d +0.8% ↺ fades | 65% | 39 | 0.24 | ✓ matches cascade |
| MU MU | SHORT | -2.2% · 5d -3.2% | 63% | 39 | 0.21 | ✓ matches cascade |
| Bitcoin BTC | SHORT | -4.7% · 5d -3.2% | 63% | 39 | 0.20 | ✓ matches cascade |
| GBPUSD GBPUSD | LONG | +0.2% · 5d -0.1% ↺ fades | 62% | 39 | 0.18 | ⚠ differs |
| AVGO AVGO | LONG | +2.1% · 5d -2.0% ↺ fades | 60% | 39 | 0.17 | ⚠ differs |
Why this probability
Rare-earth leverage already used in 2025; a sustained full halt is harder. A base‑rate‑anchored prior, continuously scored against what actually happens — not a forecast.