Trafigura Was Victim of a Nickel Fraud on a Grand Scale, Judge Says

Trafigura Group was the victim of a nickel fraud “on a grand scale” perpetrated by tycoon Prateek Gupta, a London judge ruled, giving the trading house a chance to recoup some of the hundreds of millions of dollars in losses it suffered.

The ruling marks the latest chapter in a saga that’s run since 2023 when revelations broke that Trafigura, the world’s biggest metals trader, was facing losses of almost $600 million having discovered containers of nickel it had bought from Gupta in fact contained low value substitutes.