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Chinese trading firm Zhongcai Futures has emerged as a big winner from the recent rout in silver, netting more than half a billion dollars from aggressive bets that the metal’s price would fall.
Zhongcai has booked profits of more than Rmb3.6bn ($519mn) since Friday morning after building up short positions in silver in late January, according to FT calculations based on disclosures to the Shanghai Futures Exchange.
Founded three decades ago by Bian Ximing as a manufacturer of PVC pipes before branching into futures trading, Zhongcai stands out as a rare silver bear in mainland China, even as a blistering rally in the metal gathered pace through January.
As of February 2, Zhongcai had built a bearish position in SHFE silver futures equivalent to about 484 tonnes of the metal, worth more than $1.5bn at current prices.
Driven by concerns over the safety of the US dollar and a flood of speculative bets by investors, precious metals including gold and silver surged to record highs at the start of 2026. Silver prices breached $100 per ounce on January 26 and, despite a plunge in recent days, remain up about 24 per cent this year.
Zhongcai’s profits highlight the recent wild volatility in precious metals trading, particularly in China, where regulators have been working to tamp down on speculative activity.
It also underscores how the centre of gravity for gold and silver trading is gradually shifting towards Asia, where a frenzy of retail investment in bullion was central to driving January’s historic price surge.
Zhongcai had suffered losses from shorting silver in November, but rebuilt its bearish positions during January. So far this year, the firm has generated roughly Rmb2.3bn in net profits from trading silver futures on the SHFE, according to exchange data.
Zhongcai did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The company first made its name in precious metals trading in 2024 when bullish bets on gold paid off, as prices broke through the then-record high of $2,400 per troy ounce.
Bian, who is well known among traders for his regular “self-reflection” blog posts, is also a minority investor in Damai Entertainment, the Chinese media group behind films including Green Book, Oscar-winning 1917 and several recent Mission: Impossible titles.
“There are traps and opportunities everywhere — opportunities in risks, and traps in opportunities,” Bian wrote in a blog post last year. “Investment is essentially a game of survival.”
In recent years, Bian and his trading team have increasingly focused on metals futures. In addition to gold and silver, Zhongcai built large long positions in copper futures in mid-2025, according to exchange data.
The bet appears to reflect Bian’s conviction that the global transition to clean energy and China’s push into high-tech manufacturing will boost demand, as well as the prospect of heightened volatility in US-China trade relations.
“Investment is about expectations, not predictions,” Bian wrote. “Copper is not only the lifeblood of the electric age, but also a lever of geopolitical power.”
Reporting by Leslie Hook in London and Cheng Leng in Beijing