He was convicted by a jury and will be sentenced on 23 November at the Southwark Crown Court, the same court that jailed former Delta State Governor James Ibori for defrauding Nigeria.
Hyde was specifically charged with breaching the UK's Trade in Goods (Control) Order 2003 and concealing criminal property.
He was found guilty of both breaching the law and concealing commission payments, apparently the primary reason why the British tax authorities pursued him and that also led to the uncovering of other offences and eventual conviction.
Prosecutors said he moved the weapons from China to Nigeria between March 2006 and December 2007 without a licence and hid more than one million US dollars in commission payments.
An official of Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs, Peter Millroy, said: "Hyde was an experienced arms dealer who thought he could deliberately not comply with the law in order to make some extra money to hide offshore.
"He knew full well that his activity required a licence but he decided not to comply with the law, and we are delighted that after an extensive investigation he has been brought to justice".
Hyde had earlier protested his innocence, saying in a written statement to the court: "I do not believe that I engaged in any activity in the UK which I understood to require a licence but where instead I decided to ignore that obligation".
Weekly Trust had last January reported the collapse of his earlier trial and the decision by the British government to pursue the case again.
Mr Hyde was then accused of involvement—along with his German business partner Karl Kleber—in alleged unlicensed shipment of the weapons from China to Nigeria.
But the case collapsed at the same Southwark Crown Court when the judge, Nicholas Loraine-Smith, declared "that this case has to fail in law" because the 2003 Order on which it was framed had been replaced in 2009.
However, prosecutors rejected his decision and went to the Court of Appeal which reviewed the case and ordered a re-trial.
Hyde was convicted yesterday at the second trial.
His lawyer, Stephen Solley, had earlier worked vigorously to defend him, describing the charges as ludicrous and "completely ridiculous".
He said: "The idea (that) Mr Hyde sat down and made a decision to breach this law willy-nilly, knowing full well the consequences, is, we suggest, ludicrous.
"Mr Hyde is a legitimate businessman, and to suggest he had a cavalier, couldn't care less approach and is going to go ahead regardless, we suggest that was simply not the picture.
"The idea (that) you could be sure this man put two fingers up to the criminal law knowingly is completely ridiculous."
Mr Solley further argued that the arms shipment was not arms smuggling or criminal trade, and insisted that it was a legitimate business between the Nigerian government and Chinese authorities.
"There's nothing wrong with arms dealing," he said. "This was nation state to nation state sale and purchase, between the government of China and the government of Nigeria.
"It was not to some ramshackle gang somewhere—it was government to government arms sales."
At the end, however, the jury ignored his pleas and convicted his client.
Hyde, a father of two, has reportedly been trading in arms and dealing with government agencies for 20 years.
A former director of UK companies York Guns and Jago Limited, he had served as a volunteer constable in Britain for seven years.
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