MP Materials Corp (MP)

[handsdo]

Interesting commentary from article needs and needs to be action.

MP Materials bought the mine and restarted production in 2017. The Las Vegas-headquartered company is vying to restore the domestic rare earths supply chain from mine to magnet, and is hedging its bets on neodymium-praseodymium, with the hope of becoming the lowest-cost producer.

In recent years, the Las Vegas-headquartered company received a myriad of grants and contracts from the Department of Defense and Department of Energy to research and improve domestic capabilities. One of the company’s largest customers is Shenghe Resources, a Chinese company responsible for processing, distributing and refining, which also owns a stake in the company. The connection raised some concerns among DOE scientists, according to Reuters, but government funding has continued for a rare earths separation facility.

Shenghe Resources distributes the concentrate produced at Mountain Pass to refiners in Asia, “capabilities that simply do not exist at scale in the West,” according to an MP Materials spokesman.

The company plans to reinvest the free cash flow generated from operations into expanding MP’s U.S. capabilities, including a restoration of domestic refining capability at Mountain Pass by next year. Ultimately, the company, which went public last year through a SPAC merger, plans to “restore the full rare earth supply chain” to the U.S., the spokesman said, including refining and separation, and magnet-making by 2025, as the domestic electric vehicle market ramps up production.

“This is happening and I think it’s happening much much faster than I think anybody had anticipated,” said Ryan Corbett, the company’s chief financial officer. “We can compete and we’re going to continue to do it.”

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/04/17/the-new-us-plan-to-rival-chinas-dominance-in-rare-earth-metals.html