In October–November 2014 he scored a major success in the second leg of the FIDE Grand Prix in Tashkent, winning the tournament ahead of Hikaru Nakamura, Shakhriyar Mamedyarov, Fabiano Caruana and eight other elite grandmasters. His score of 7/11 gave him a performance rating of 2852. However his other Grand Prix results were not as good, and he was knocked out the Chess World Cup 2015 by eventual winner Sergey Karjakin, so he missed qualification for the 2016 Candidates Tournament.