* Not financial advice DYORAny company that is able vertically...

* Not financial advice DYOR

Any company that is able vertically integrate as much of its commodity production, will be the least affected when its corresponding spot price drops.

You will also need to account for the mining landscape. Everyone and their dog can be a junior explorer, but how many of them will be able to find enough resources to justify setting up a mine. Even if an explorer becomes a miner, how many of them would survive if the raw commodity spot prices does not fall in their favour.

The beauty of being a refiner/processor/vertical producer is the profit margin from the "value-add" would be less affected by spot price volatility.
Take negative crude oil price during covid as an example, crude went negative but refined fuel prices only went down slightly. Nobody needs crude barrels, but everyone needs fuel.

Apply this concept to critical metals, not many need hard rock but many need it's refined state to make batteries and other consumer products. Moreover, the knowledge and expertise to create refined/intermediary products is vastly superior and complex, compared to just selling hard rocks. Thus the level of entry to become a refiner is way higher than being a miner.

Scalability is another factor, miners can only scale if they find more resources in the ground (limiting input, and luck required), but a refiner/processor can always buy raw commodities from many miners (non-limiting input).

If raw supply is a concern, a refiner can become a miner due its lesser complex level of entry.
Example, a specialised surgeon can be a doctor, but a doctor can't be a surgeon (not 100% factual but you get what I mean)

This is why Tesla has a bigger market cap than all other car manufacturers combined. Tesla is a vertical producer, others arent (but are gradually catching up).

TLDR: Refiners/Vertical producer will outperform conventional explorers and miners, unless you have monstrous proven resources.