NZC exploration program overview, page-84

I think everyone has priced in tax hikes on cobalt from the DRC for quite some time, makes a lot of sense for a country with no money to jack up taxes on a commodity that they have a huge amount of control over. IMO, country taxes can be passed downstream without much issue. Cobalt is in super high demand, and that demand is fairly inelastic for the time being. People will pay whatever it takes to get it.

Actually, given the government is turning cobalt into a tax revenue source I'd expect them to spend more time and resources on protecting cobalt mines from civil instability, and developing infrastructure to actually get the mines going (and hence, generating tax).

So good news overall, despite having to pay greater tax.