📈 Markets & Finance mixed · 0–6 months
A what‑if from the future

What if Copper warehousing arbitrage drains LME stocks to Asia?

A pricing and logistics arbitrage pulls LME copper into Asian bonded warehouses, hollowing out visible Western stocks and tightening deliverable supply.

23%
our model probability
over 0–6 months
prediction markets — wisdom of the crowd
loading live odds…
Empirically anchored 23% · 90% range 2–44% · 9 analogues · measured class growth 61% in 6 mo · 3% held back for the unknown
how we built this number — every step
Measured class rate — growth ≈1.8868/yr → 61% in 6 mo61%
Analyst prior · editorial share 46% of the class28%
Pooled · weight 60%24%
Crowd — no liquid market
Reserve 3% · no extremizing (×1.0)24%
Published23%

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 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. 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. A pricing and logistics arbitrage pulls LME copper into Asian bonded warehouses, hollowing out visible Western stocks and tightening deliverable supply. 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.

MarketClassProjected move
1Freeport (copper) FCX 📈 chartEquity▲ +0.8%
hist -6.29–+6.34% · other way +2.06% (n=12)
2Copper XCUon Hyperliquid 📈 chartCommodity▲ +0.7%
hist -0.25–+1.42% · other way -0.23% (n=12)

Probable recommendation

If the scenario above plays out, the probable cross‑asset positioning → a scenario‑conditional read, not personalized investment advice
Short
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) +0.8%

Historical precedent — what analogous events actually did

Across 9 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.

Platinum hits an 11-year high on Chinese jewelry demand and deficit 2025-06 Palladium jumps after US pushes G7 sanctions on Russian metal 2024-10 Copper tops $10,000 a tonne for the first time since 2011 2021-04 China's PBOC reveals 57% jump in gold reserves after six-year silence 2015-07 Silver hits 30-year high as JPMorgan and HSBC face manipulation suits 2010-10 Copper crashes to ~$1.30/lb as 2008 crisis crushes China demand 2008-12 China 4 trillion yuan stimulus 2008-11 Soviet August coup attempt against Gorbachev 1991-08 Volcker Saturday Night Special 1979-10
AssetHistory saysAbnormal (20d · 5d)HitnConfidencevs cascade
High-yield credit HYGSHORT-1.9% · 5d -0.2%87%7 0.65·
Volatility VIXSHORT-6.0% · 5d -3.0%88%8 0.47·
FCX FCXSHORT-7.5% · 5d -2.9%60%7 0.17⚠ differs
10y yield DGS10LONG+6bp · 5d +6bp58%9 0.14·
US dollar DXYLONG+0.6% · 5d -0.2% ↺ fades58%9 0.13·
Bitcoin BTCSHORT-1.0% · 5d -3.2%56%4 0.08·
Gold XAULONG+1.1% · 5d -0.3% ↺ fades53%7 0.05·
XCU XCULONG+0.8% · 5d +0.4%33%7 0.00✓ 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.