What if Chinese smelters idle on negative margins, refined copper squeeze?
Sustained negative TC/RCs force coordinated Chinese smelter maintenance shutdowns; refined copper availability drops sharply and the cash-3M spread flips to backwardation.
30%
our model probability over 1–3 years
prediction markets — wisdom of the crowd
loading live odds…
◎ Empirically anchored 30%· 90% range 18–41%· 40 analogues · measured class growth 100% in 3 yr · 3% held back for the unknownhow we built this number — every step
Measured class rate — growth ≈1.8868/yr → 100% in 3 yr100%
Analyst prior · editorial share 31% of the class31%
Pooled · weight 87%30%
Crowd — no liquid market—
Reserve 3% · no extremizing (×1.0)30%
Published30%
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. Sustained negative TC/RCs force coordinated Chinese smelter maintenance shutdowns; refined copper availability drops sharply and the cash-3M spread flips to backwardation. The trigger decomposes into signed root‑shocks — Copper ▲ · China growth ▲ · Industrial demand ▲ · Risk appetite ▼ — 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
Freeport (copper)FCX📈 chart
Equity
▲ +0.9%
hist -5.88–+2.15% · other way +8.06% (n=11)
2
CopperXCUon Hyperliquid📈 chart
Commodity
▲ +0.8%
hist -1.15–+0.71% · other way +1.17% (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) +0.9%
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 $4,000 and silver spikes past $50 in historic squeeze 2025-10↗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↗ASML bookings-miss crash 2024-10↗Gold tops $2,500 for the first time on Fed rate-cut bets 2024-08↗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↗Chinese yuan breaks 7 per dollar; US names China manipulator 2019-08↗Apple cuts revenue guidance on China weakness 2019-01↗North Korea sixth nuclear test 2017-09↗North Korea 'fire and fury' nuclear scare 2017-08↗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↗Thai baht float 1997-07↗Soviet August coup attempt against Gorbachev 1991-08↗Tiananmen Square crackdown 1989-06↗Hong Kong Stock Exchange four-day closure after Black Monday 1987-10↗Chernobyl disaster 1986-04↗Silver Thursday 1980-03↗Gold peaks at $850 1980-01↗Iran hostage crisis / US freezes Iranian assets 1979-11↗Three Mile Island partial meltdown 1979-03↗1979 Iranian Revolution oil shock 1979-01↗Record $19bn crypto liquidation cascade 2025-10↗Fatal mud-rush halts Freeport's Grasberg, tightening copper supply 2025-09↗