What if Solar-panel trade war: tariffs slow Western deployment?
Steep tariffs on Chinese solar panels and batteries raise Western clean-energy costs and slow deployment, trimming the renewables build-out and lifting trade tension.
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 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.
What it would mean
If this plays out, it is a risk-off shock. Steep tariffs on Chinese solar panels and batteries raise Western clean-energy costs and slow deployment, trimming the renewables build-out and lifting trade tension. The trigger decomposes into signed root‑shocks — Clean-energy abundance ▼ · Industrial demand ▼ · Inflation expectations ▲ · Trade tension ▲ — 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 | Nasdaq 100 NDXon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Index | ▼ -1.3% hist -0.85–-0.47% · other way -0.41% (n=11) |
| 2 | Semiconductors SMHon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -1.1% hist -0.77–-0.1% · other way -0.63% (n=11) |
| 3 | Energy sector XLEon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Equity | ▲ +0.9% hist -1.52–+0.61% · other way -3.24% (n=11) |
| 4 | Nvidia NVDAon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -0.9% hist -0.56–-0.31% · other way +0.47% (n=11) |
| 5 | TSMC TSMon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -0.9% hist -0.57–-0.3% · other way -1.84% (n=11) |
| 6 | Tech sector XLK 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -0.8% hist -0.64–-0.08% · other way -0.19% (n=11) |
| 7 | Alibaba BABAon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -0.8% hist -2.25–+0.39% · other way -3.49% (n=10) |
| 8 | Brent crude BRENTon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Commodity | ▲ +0.8% hist -3.05–+0.82% · other way -5.19% (n=11) |
| 9 | ExxonMobil XOM 📈 chart | Equity | ▲ +0.7% hist -0.69–+0.68% · other way -0.93% (n=12) |
| 10 | WTI crude CLon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Commodity | ▲ +0.7% hist -2.84–+0.62% · other way -5.24% (n=11) |
| 11 | ASML ASMLon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -0.7% hist -2.07–+0.58% · other way -5.5% (n=11) |
| 12 | AMD AMDon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -0.7% hist -0.69–+0.31% · other way -4.42% (n=11) |
| 13 | Broadcom AVGOon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -0.7% hist -1.19–+1.69% · other way -0.53% (n=10) |
| 14 | Micron MUon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -0.7% hist -0.52–-0.23% · other way -5.71% (n=11) |
Probable recommendation
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CL CL | SHORT | -2.5% · 5d -3.4% | 73% | 35 | 0.40 | ⚠ differs |
| XCU XCU | SHORT | -2.9% · 5d -0.8% | 71% | 35 | 0.38 | ✓ matches cascade |
| BRENT BRENT | SHORT | -2.8% · 5d -3.4% | 70% | 35 | 0.36 | ⚠ differs |
| CNY CNY | SHORT | -0.4% · 5d -0.2% | 68% | 35 | 0.36 | ✓ matches cascade |
| XLE XLE | SHORT | -1.6% · 5d -1.4% | 68% | 35 | 0.35 | ⚠ differs |
| MRVL MRVL | LONG | +2.9% · 5d -0.5% ↺ fades | 68% | 35 | 0.28 | ⚠ differs |
| KWEB KWEB | SHORT | -1.6% · 5d -1.5% | 66% | 29 | 0.27 | ✓ matches cascade |
| FCX FCX | SHORT | -2.3% · 5d -1.1% | 63% | 35 | 0.23 | ✓ matches cascade |
| INTC INTC | SHORT | -0.9% · 5d -0.7% | 62% | 37 | 0.21 | ✓ matches cascade |
| BABA BABA | SHORT | -1.7% · 5d -2.6% | 61% | 28 | 0.20 | ✓ matches cascade |
| QCOM QCOM | SHORT | -2.3% · 5d -2.3% | 64% | 35 | 0.20 | ✓ matches cascade |
| AUD AUD | SHORT | -0.7% · 5d -0.3% | 62% | 35 | 0.19 | ✓ matches cascade |
| EURUSD EURUSD | SHORT | -0.7% · 5d -0.0% | 58% | 35 | 0.14 | ✓ matches cascade |
| UAL UAL | LONG | +6.0% · 5d +0.3% | 58% | 35 | 0.13 | ⚠ differs |