The Chinese Xi administration may choose to leverage its state dominance of rare-earth elements to better balance the current Sino-U.S. trade war.

Dan Rochefort

2019-06-13 10:26:00 Thu ET

The Chinese Xi administration may choose to leverage its state dominance of rare-earth elements to better balance the current Sino-U.S. trade war. In recent times, President Xi visits a Jiangxi hardware factory that spins rare earth elements into permanent magnets in iPhones, electric cars, wind turbines, and military missiles. China monopolizes 80% of the strenuous extraction of 17 vital rare-earth elements for ubiquitous applications from consumer electronic technology to military defense. Although the raw ores are as common as copper and lead, rare-earth ores oxidize quickly and their extraction can cause severe pollution. With its low labor costs and lax environmental regulations, China has become the dominant force in the rare-earth market since the 1980s. With almost half of global rare-earth deposits, China produces 120,000 metric tons of rare-earth per annum, or about 80% of the global supply. Australia is the second largest supplier of only 20,000 metric tons of rare-earth per year.

The Chinese Xi administration has a strategic incentive to reduce the quota of rare-earth elements for better environmental protection. The next quota reset is due in June 2019, and this reset can indicate whether China intends to leverage its rare-earth quasi-monopoly to counteract the Trump tariff tactic.

 


If any of our AYA Analytica financial health memos (FHM), blog posts, ebooks, newsletters, and notifications etc, or any other form of online content curation, involves potential copyright concerns, please feel free to contact us at service@ayafintech.network so that we can remove relevant content in response to any such request within a reasonable time frame.

Blog+More

Zillow share price plunges 20% year-to-date as Redfin and Trulia also experience an economic slowdown in the real estate market.

Daisy Harvey

2018-11-17 09:33:00 Saturday ET

Zillow share price plunges 20% year-to-date as Redfin and Trulia also experience an economic slowdown in the real estate market.

Zillow share price plunges 20% year-to-date as its competitors Redfin and Trulia also experience an economic slowdown in the real estate market. The real es

+See More

From crony capitalism to state capitalism, what economic policy lessons can we learn from Putin's reign in Russia?

Jonah Whanau

2018-03-13 07:34:00 Tuesday ET

From crony capitalism to state capitalism, what economic policy lessons can we learn from Putin's reign in Russia?

From crony capitalism to state capitalism, what economic policy lessons can we learn from President Putin's current reign in Russia? In the 15 years of

+See More

Snap cannot keep up with the Kardashians because its stock loses $1 billion market value after Kylie Jenner tweets about her decision to leave Snapchat.

Monica McNeil

2018-02-19 08:39:00 Monday ET

Snap cannot keep up with the Kardashians because its stock loses $1 billion market value after Kylie Jenner tweets about her decision to leave Snapchat.

Snap cannot keep up with the Kardashians because its stock loses market value 7% or $1 billion after Kylie Jenner tweets about her decision to leave Snapcha

+See More

Chicago finance professor Raghuram Rajan suggests that free markets need populist support against an unholy alliance of private-sector and state elites.

John Fourier

2019-05-21 12:37:00 Tuesday ET

Chicago finance professor Raghuram Rajan suggests that free markets need populist support against an unholy alliance of private-sector and state elites.

Chicago finance professor Raghuram Rajan shows that free markets need populist support against an unholy alliance of private-sector and state elites. When a

+See More

Ford and Baidu team up to test autonomous cars in China.

Jonah Whanau

2018-11-01 08:36:00 Thursday ET

Ford and Baidu team up to test autonomous cars in China.

Ford and Baidu team up to test autonomous cars in China. For the next few years, Ford and Baidu plan to collaborate on the car design and user acceptance te

+See More

Federal Reserve's interest rate hike may lead to an economic recession as credit supply growth ebbs and flows through the business cycle.

Monica McNeil

2018-06-14 10:35:00 Thursday ET

Federal Reserve's interest rate hike may lead to an economic recession as credit supply growth ebbs and flows through the business cycle.

The Federal Reserve's current interest rate hike may lead to the next economic recession as credit supply growth ebbs and flows through the business cyc

+See More