Niocorp Developments Ltd (NB)

[Contrarian58]

It's not that the deposits of rare earths are small. The Elk Creek carbonatite is about 7 km in diameter. The issue is that the market for rare earths in controlled by China, both at the mine and the processing ends, and is far riskier than the niobium/scandium/titanium market. If you look at the maps, the Niocorp project is a tiny dot of scandium and niobium enriched ore in the middle of a huge deposit of metals. I've always considered this project to be a niobium/scandium play with an option on rare earths, should the market opportunity arise. It would be far easier to "mine" rare earths from either a pregnant process liquor or from enriched tailings than from a new mine elsewhere. They will be mining this deposit for a century or more. It would not surprise me at all if other metals were extracted at some point.