China's Grip on Rare Earths May Have Proven Too Strong for Trump

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-09-18/china-s-grip-on-rare-earths-may-have-proven-too-strong-for-trump

China's Grip on Rare Earths May Have Proven Too Strong for Trump
By Martin Ritchie
September 18, 2018, 1:44 AM CDT
- Minerals no longer in list of Chinese goods targeted by U.S.
- China supplied 78% of America’s rare earths imports last year

The U.S. appears to have shelved its plan to levy tariffs on a critical collection of minerals used in everything from hybrid vehicles to electronic gadgets and military hardware.

Rare earths including scandium and yttrium are absent from the latest list of about $200 billion of Chinese goods on which the Trump administration plans to impost duties from next week. They were among a number of items scrubbed from the preliminary target list released in July along with car seats and Bluetooth devices.



Their inclusion in the first place was odd. China produced more than 80 percent of the world’s rare-earth metals and compounds in 2017, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. It has about 37 percent of global reserves and supplied 78 percent of America’s imports.

Other niche but important materials were also missing from the revised list. These included graphite flakes, as well as some forms of silicon and magnesium.