What if China reimposes its graphite export curbs?
Beijing reinstating and widening synthetic/spherical graphite license controls chokes Western anode makers — a genuine trade-weapon shock to EV battery supply chains and ex-China anode startups; the broad Nasdaq/semis -2.9% cascade overstates the tech-index hit since graphite is a battery, not chip, input. Rhymes with China's Oct-2023 graphite export controls and the 2010 rare-earth embargo on Japan. Forward angle: China refines ~90% of anode graphite, so the leverage is real and durable; the cleanest trade is ex-China anode/battery-materials equities (Novonix, Syrah) higher and Western EV-cost pressure, not a semis sell-off.
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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 (electric blue) over time vs the market's (Polymarket, amber), from the past toward the 0–6 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. Loading the probability audit trail…
What it would mean
If this plays out, it is a risk-off shock. After the November 2026 suspension lapses, Beijing reinstates and widens synthetic and spherical graphite license controls, choking Western anode makers. :: The trigger decomposes into signed root‑shocks — Trade tension ▲ · Industrial demand ▲ — which propagate through our causal graph to the markets below.