What if a dramatic US move on the SPR jolts crude prices?
A dramatic SPR drawdown (or refill) jolts crude on the flow surprise — a release pushes Brent/WTI and products lower, softening breakevens and energy equities. The live analogue is the 2022 180m-barrel SPR release that helped cap crude into year-end. Forward angle: with the SPR near multi-decade lows, drawdown ammunition is largely spent and a refill bid is the more probable forward catalyst — so the asymmetry now skews to crude support, not the downside the cascade shows.
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 mixed shock. The US announces a dramatic SPR drawdown or refill, jolting crude. The trigger decomposes into signed root‑shocks — 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 | Brent crude BRENTon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Commodity | ▼ -2.4% hist -2.53–-0.27% · other way -1.63% (n=12) |
| 2 | WTI crude CLon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Commodity | ▼ -2.0% hist -4.05–+0.26% · other way -2.71% (n=12) |
| 3 | Energy sector XLEon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -1.4% hist -0.94–-0.24% · other way +1.41% (n=12) |
| 4 | United Airlines UAL 📈 chart | Equity | ▲ +1.2% hist -1.16–+4.88% · other way +2.48% (n=12) |
| 5 | ExxonMobil XOM 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -1.0% hist -0.99–+0.46% · other way +1.6% (n=12) |
| 6 | Chevron CVX 📈 chart | Equity | ▼ -0.9% hist -0.58–-0.22% · other way +0.7% (n=12) |
| 7 | Delta DAL 📈 chart | Equity | ▲ +1.0% hist -0.48–+2.51% · other way +0.05% (n=12) |
| 8 | 30y Treasury yield DGS30 📈 chart | Rate | ▼ -4bp hist -4.54–-0.36% · other way +4.8% (n=12) |
| 9 | Gold XAUon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Commodity | ▲ +0.4% hist -0.01–+0.2% · other way +0.57% (n=12) |
| 10 | 10y Treasury yield DGS10 📈 chart | Rate | ▼ -4bp hist -4.93–+0.05% · other way +9.1% (n=12) |
| 11 | Tech sector XLK 📈 chart | Equity | ▲ +0.3% hist +0.04–+0.29% · other way -1.25% (n=12) |
| 12 | Nasdaq 100 NDXon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Index | ▲ +0.2% hist -0.09–+0.11% · other way -1.27% (n=12) |
| 13 | MicroStrategy MSTRon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Equity | ▲ +0.2% hist -1.58–+3.45% · other way +12.66% (n=12) |
| 14 | Bitcoin BTCon Hyperliquid 📈 chart | Crypto | ▲ +0.2% hist -4.77–+1.2% · other way +4.62% (n=12) |
Probable recommendation
Why we may diverge from history
Trust the cascade long on BTC: the -6.8% rests on the 2020 price-war/COVID circuit-breaker crash and a single Venezuela window — a liquidation regime, not an SPR-jolt tape; stale, contaminated sample.
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ARM ARM | SHORT | -10.0% · 5d -10.7% | 73% | 8 | 0.33 | ⚠ differs |
| CL CL | SHORT | -2.8% · 5d -2.1% | 67% | 37 | 0.30 | ✓ matches cascade |
| Bitcoin BTC | SHORT | -4.2% · 5d -4.9% | 68% | 36 | 0.29 | ⚠ differs |
| Volatility VIX | SHORT | -7.7% · 5d -3.6% | 65% | 39 | 0.27 | · |
| NDX NDX | SHORT | -0.2% · 5d -0.8% | 67% | 40 | 0.26 | ⚠ differs |
| Gold XAU | SHORT | -0.1% · 5d -1.4% | 62% | 37 | 0.20 | ⚠ differs |
| BRENT BRENT | SHORT | -1.2% · 5d -1.4% | 60% | 37 | 0.17 | ✓ matches cascade |
| UAL UAL | LONG | +4.0% · 5d -0.6% ↺ fades | 60% | 37 | 0.16 | ✓ matches cascade |
| 10y yield DGS10 | SHORT | -3bp · 5d +2bp ↺ fades | 58% | 40 | 0.14 | ✓ matches cascade |
| US dollar DXY | LONG | +0.6% · 5d +0.4% | 56% | 40 | 0.11 | ⚠ differs |
| DAL DAL | LONG | +1.9% · 5d -1.3% ↺ fades | 55% | 37 | 0.09 | ✓ matches cascade |
| XLE XLE | LONG | +0.3% · 5d -0.6% ↺ fades | 52% | 38 | 0.04 | ⚠ differs |
| CVX CVX | LONG | +0.1% · 5d -0.3% ↺ fades | 52% | 40 | 0.04 | ⚠ differs |
| 30y yield DGS30 | SHORT | -2bp · 5d +1bp ↺ fades | 52% | 40 | 0.03 | ✓ matches cascade |
Why this probability
Dramatic SPR move possible but politically constrained now; modest 6mo odds. A base‑rate‑anchored prior, continuously scored against what actually happens — not a forecast.