Qingdao probe raises more questions

[QINGDAO] Is the metal stored in a Chinese warehouse really there? Has the peanut oil shipment a bank lent money against been swapped for worthless water?

Basic questions have begun to play on the minds of traders and bankers doing business in the world's largest raw material importer, after an investigation began at Qingdao Port, a huge trading hub in the north-east, into whether more than one licence had been issued against the same material.

The duplication, which leaves someone out of pocket when they claim what they thought was theirs, may be the result of deliberate fraud by a company using the same metal to raise multiple loans.