What if drone strikes cripple a fifth of Russia's refining?
Sustained drone strikes knocking out a fifth of Russian refining slash product exports, lifting global diesel and gasoline cracks while crude rises only modestly (lost runs free up Russian crude for export); long product cracks plus a VIX bid is the trade. Directly rhymes with the early-2024 Ukrainian refinery-drone campaign, which spiked global diesel cracks and forced Russia into a temporary gasoline export ban, with flat Brent moving far less. Transmission: tighter Russian product exports pull Europe/Turkey/Africa onto other refiners; forward angle: 2026 strikes hit a market with thinner global refining buffers.
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 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.
What it would mean
If this plays out, it is a risk-off shock. Sustained drone strikes knock out a fifth of Russian refining, slashing product exports and lifting cracks. The trigger decomposes into signed root‑shocks — Geopolitical risk ▲ · Oil 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 | Volatility (VIX) VIXon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Vol | ▲ +6.4% hist +0.98–+5.71% · other way -9.61% (n=12) |
| 2 | Brent crude BRENTon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Commodity | ▲ +4.2% hist +1.48–+2.67% · other way +0.33% (n=12) |
| 3 | WTI crude CLon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Commodity | ▲ +3.5% hist -1.16–+2.19% · other way +4.42% (n=12) |
| 4 | Nasdaq 100 NDXon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Index | ▼ -3.0% hist -2.0–-0.52% · other way +0.27% (n=12) |
| 5 | Energy sector XLEon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Equity | ▲ +2.5% hist +0.33–+2.65% · other way +0.21% (n=12) |
| 6 | Tech sector XLK 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -2.3% hist -1.42–-0.76% · other way +0.29% (n=12) |
| 7 | S&P 500 SPXon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Index | ▼ -1.6% hist -1.4–-0.38% · other way +0.66% (n=12) |
| 8 | United Airlines UAL 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -2.1% hist -2.73–+2.51% · other way +5.33% (n=12) |
| 9 | ExxonMobil XOM 📈 chart | Equity | ▲ +1.8% hist -0.07–+2.52% · other way -2.72% (n=12) |
| 10 | Chevron CVX 📈 chart | Equity | ▲ +1.6% hist +0.25–+1.48% · other way +0.18% (n=12) |
| 11 | Delta DAL 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -1.8% hist -1.67–+1.1% · other way +5.19% (n=12) |
| 12 | MicroStrategy MSTRon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -1.4% hist -1.95–+1.98% · other way +11.86% (n=12) |
| 13 | Semiconductors SMHon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -1.3% hist -1.13–-0.3% · other way -0.2% (n=12) |
| 14 | Solana SOLon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Crypto | ▼ -1.1% hist -4.0–+6.56% · other way -1.88% (n=11) |
Probable recommendation
Why we may diverge from history
Trust the cascade SHORT on COIN/HOOD/MSTR: their +16-22% comes entirely from 2024-25 Israel-Iran/tariff windows in a BTC structural bull — regime beta, not a read on Russian refinery drone strikes.
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CNY CNY | SHORT | -0.7% · 5d -0.1% | 71% | 31 | 0.41 | ✓ matches cascade |
| MRVL MRVL | SHORT | -2.4% · 5d -3.0% | 73% | 31 | 0.34 | ✓ matches cascade |
| NDX NDX | SHORT | -0.7% · 5d -0.8% | 72% | 38 | 0.33 | ✓ matches cascade |
| COIN COIN | LONG | +9.0% · 5d +2.2% | 69% | 15 | 0.31 | ⚠ differs |
| HOOD HOOD | LONG | +6.0% · 5d +0.4% | 69% | 15 | 0.30 | ⚠ differs |
| AMD AMD | SHORT | -2.2% · 5d -1.3% | 69% | 39 | 0.29 | ✓ matches cascade |
| NVDA NVDA | SHORT | -2.2% · 5d -4.6% | 66% | 32 | 0.26 | ✓ matches cascade |
| JPM JPM | LONG | +2.3% · 5d +0.0% | 64% | 39 | 0.24 | ⚠ differs |
| Volatility VIX | LONG | +2.5% · 5d +2.5% | 64% | 35 | 0.23 | ✓ matches cascade |
| TSM TSM | SHORT | -2.1% · 5d -3.2% | 64% | 33 | 0.22 | ✓ matches cascade |
| QCOM QCOM | SHORT | -2.1% · 5d -1.7% | 63% | 33 | 0.21 | ✓ matches cascade |
| INR INR | SHORT | -0.3% · 5d +0.1% ↺ fades | 63% | 28 | 0.20 | ✓ matches cascade |
| CL CL | SHORT | -2.4% · 5d -1.5% | 61% | 31 | 0.19 | ⚠ differs |
| MU MU | SHORT | -3.0% · 5d -4.1% | 62% | 38 | 0.19 | ✓ matches cascade |
Why this probability
Ukraine drone campaign already knocking out Russian refining in 2025-26; ongoing developing trend. A base‑rate‑anchored prior, continuously scored against what actually happens — not a forecast.