This extract from The Australian: Monsters of Rock: Crazy US...

This extract from The Australian:

Monsters of Rock: Crazy US government rare earths deal puts rocket under sector

• US DoD will spend billions to bankroll and subsidise oxide and magnet production from US rare earths miner MP Materials
• Deal includes price floor of US$110/kg NdPr – as much as double Chinese market prices
• Could provide Western price incentive for delayed mine developments and M&A: Canaccord Genuity

America's Department of Defense has stunningly intervened in the rare earths market, promising a floor price of US$110 per kg for NdPr oxide and billions in investments to bankroll a magnet production line operated by New York listed MP Materials.

It's a unique shift in the free-market ideology that has governed the American business community for decades, with the Trump Admnistration and Pentagon playing at China's game by heavily subsidising the rare earths industry in the face of its strategic competitor's market supremacy.

MP owns the Mountain Pass mine in California, the only light rare earths producer in the United States.
Previously it exported much of its material to China to be processed by Shenghe Resources, a major players in the rare earths market in the Middle Kingdom. Sales to China are no longer taking place.

Under the deal the DoD will enter a 10-year agreement to sell and stockpile rare earths with a US$110/kg price floor, around double the price of NdPr oxide in China – the jurisdiction which has previously set market prices with over 80% of the supply chain based in the Communist powerhouse.

That move could genuinely support a bifurcated market that could see Western markets support incentive pricing to build ex-China operations.

"Overall, we expect the deal to be a positive for the rare earth industry outside China broadly resulting in the imposition and adoption of floor prices for critical rare earths coupled with tariff regimes to enforce them," analysts at Adamas Intelligence said.

"Although elevated prices may prompt some end-users to explore alternatives, this shift will free up rare earth supplies for mission-critical sectors like robotics, aerospace, and defense, ensuring availability in a future marked otherwise by constrained global supply."

JPMorgan and Goldman Sachs will provide US$1bn of finance to support a magnet facility MP is operating to boost production to 10,000t after commissioning in 2028, while MP also expects to receive the proceeds of a US$150m loan from the DoD to expand its heavy rare earth production capabilities at Mountain Pass.

Heavy rare earths are almost entirely dominated by China, and were the subject of export controls that have hurt US automakers in the midst of a tariff cold war between Trump's America and Xi Jinping's China.

*********** I notice that S...head publisher studiously never mentions IXR? I guess the company must have to engage S...head's services??

The article certainly reinforces the post above.

An investment or confirmed funding from a US source will surely catapult IXR into another league?!