Chinese Trader’s $20 Million Pile of Russian Copper Goes Missing

A giant state-owned Chinese commodities trader is nursing losses after a shipment of copper from Russia worth nearly $20 million went missing, reigniting fears over fraud in the often secretive market for buying and selling raw materials.

Wuchan Zhongda Group Co., which had sales of 580 billion yuan ($80 billion) in 2023, bought 2,000 tons of refined copper from a Russian smelter that should have been delivered last month. It never made it to port, according to people with knowledge of the incident.

Instead, the metal was listed as much cheaper granite and has likely ended up in Turkey, ...