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

Presidents Trump and Xi agree on an interim trade truce at the G20 summit in Argentina.

Apple Boston

2018-12-09 08:44:00 Sunday ET

Presidents Trump and Xi agree on an interim trade truce at the G20 summit in Argentina.

President Trump meets with Chinese President Xi again at the G20 summit in the city of Buenos Aires, Argentina, in late-November 2018. President Donald Trum

+See More

President Trump may reluctantly sign the congressional border wall deal in order to avert another U.S. government shutdown.

Apple Boston

2019-02-13 11:00:00 Wednesday ET

President Trump may reluctantly sign the congressional border wall deal in order to avert another U.S. government shutdown.

President Trump may reluctantly sign the congressional border wall deal in order to avert another U.S. government shutdown. With his executive power to decl

+See More

The social media factor serves as a new measure of investor sentiment in addition to the fundamental factors.

Rose Prince

2017-05-07 06:39:00 Sunday ET

The social media factor serves as a new measure of investor sentiment in addition to the fundamental factors.

While the original five-factor asset pricing model arises from a quasi-lifetime of top empirical research by Nobel Laureate Eugene Fama and his long-time co

+See More

Many U.S. large public corporations spend their tax cuts on new dividend payout and share buyback.

Jacob Miramar

2018-05-23 09:41:00 Wednesday ET

Many U.S. large public corporations spend their tax cuts on new dividend payout and share buyback.

Many U.S. large public corporations spend their tax cuts on new dividend payout and share buyback but not on new job creation and R&D innovation. These

+See More

Corporate payout management

Fiona Sydney

2022-05-05 09:34:00 Thursday ET

Corporate payout management

Corporate payout management This corporate payout literature review rests on the recent survey article by Farre-Mensa, Michaely, and Schmalz (2014). Out

+See More

President Trump promises a great trade deal with China as Americans mull over mid-term elections.

Laura Hermes

2018-11-13 12:30:00 Tuesday ET

President Trump promises a great trade deal with China as Americans mull over mid-term elections.

President Trump promises a great trade deal with China as Americans mull over mid-term elections. President Trump wants to reach a trade accord with Chinese

+See More