Thought
Rare earths are the new oil
Rare earths are becoming the chokepoint oil used to be, and China holds the valve.
They are the metals inside the magnets that drive electric cars, wind turbines, drones and missiles.
China refines most of them and makes buyers apply for an export licence.
Outside China, the same metal already costs up to a third more.
Oil has strategic reserves, many suppliers and decades of practice.
Rare earths have almost none of that.
Every country that wants to electrify or rearm runs into the same supplier, and new mines and refineries take most of a decade.
Until then, a licence decision in Beijing moves markets as much as a tanker in Hormuz.