Shares of Cleveland-Cliffs (CLF) rose as much as 24% early Monday morning after the company announced it would redouble efforts related to the extraction of rare earth minerals, which has become one of the hottest commodities trades on Wall Street this year.
“Beyond steel production, the renewed importance of rare earths has led us to refocus on this potential opportunity in our upstream mining assets,” CEO Lourenco Goncalves said in the company’s earnings release.
“We have looked at all of our deposits and tailings basins, and two sites in particular, one in Michigan and one in Minnesota, show the most potential. At these two sites, geological studies show key indicators of rare earth mineralization. If successful, it would align Cleveland-Cliffs with the broader national strategy for critical materials independence, similar to what we achieved with steel.”
Ohio-based Cleveland Cliffs, long dominant in the U.S. steel industry, operates a fully vertically integrated iron and steel supply chain, extracting iron ore from the ground, refining and processing it into steel, and then selling that steel and a collection of derived products to other customers.
The company on Monday reported third-quarter revenue of $4.7 billion on steel shipments of 4 million net tons. Adjusted net losses amounted to $0.45 for the quarter.
Cleveland-Cliffs’ comments come at a time when rare earths, critical in industries such as weapons manufacturing, batteries and electric vehicle development, have become the focal point of an escalation of trade maneuvers between Washington and Beijing.
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After China unveiled a sweeping series of new export controls that restricted shipments of products with even traces of a group of rare metals, President Trump threatened to impose 100% tariffs on all Chinese goods before reversing that threat.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the United States and China will hold talks later this week in Malaysia. But Washington has a long way to go to match Beijing’s dominance in rare earth supplies.
Currently, China controls 70% of the mining capacity, 90% of the separation capacity and 93% of the production of oxides and rare earth minerals and metals worldwide.
As Cleveland-Cliffs’ Goncalves said: “American manufacturing should not depend on China or any foreign nation for essential minerals, and Cliffs intends to be part of the solution.”
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As part of the administration’s efforts to gain ground on China, the White House and the Department of Defense have invested throughout the year in a number of mining companies, including MP Materials (MP), which operates the only operational rare earths mine in the US, Trilogy Metals (TMQ) and Lithium Americas (LAC).