Potential Molycorp all over again IMO.
MP said that “in recent weeks” it had started refining small amounts of its own rare earths in California, a goal the company had been pursuing for more than three years. The company did not provide volumes and said it was working to complete commissioning of the refining equipment.
Executives said they were comfortable with the chemistry that underpins the refining, but that more work remained to calibrate the physical processing equipment. They said they could not yet forecast 2024 production or revenue from sales of rare earths refined by the California equipment.
“There’s a little bit more work to do before we can say that all the bugs are worked out or that we’re 100% confident,” Michael Rosenthal, MP’s chief operating officer, told investors on a conference call.
“But the general processes are working. We feel comfortable that what we’ve designed is able to perform to the design basis of our circuits and that with time, we’ll get to greater throughput, reliability and performance yield.”
https://www.mining.com/web/mp-materials-quarterly-profit-drops-90-on-lower-rare-earths-prices/
(20min delay)