4 April 2025: China's Ministry of Commerce introduced export controls on seven rare-earth elements — samarium, gadolinium, terbium, dysprosium, lutetium, scandium and yttrium — plus related alloys, compounds, metals, oxides and magnets. Exporters now require specific licenses rather than operating under the previous general-export regime.
October 2025: controls expanded to five additional elements plus processing equipment. European rare-earth prices reached up to six times Chinese levels during the tightest months. Japanese and South Korean buyers experienced shorter disruptions than U.S. customers.
November 2025: the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation committed up to US$465 million to Serra Verde's Pela Ema operation. The largest single federal financing ever extended to a Latin American critical-minerals project. Signals Washington treats Serra Verde as strategically comparable to MP Materials — its own flagship domestic rare-earth asset.
July 2025: the Department of Defense announced a transformational partnership with MP Materials to build 10,000 tonnes of annual rare-earth magnet capacity by 2028 — approximately ten times MP's current production. The 10X programme is the biggest visible bet on non-Chinese rare-earth independence.
The EU CRMA (adopted March 2024) targets 10% extraction, 40% processing, 25% recycling of critical minerals inside the EU by 2030, capping single-country dependency at 65%. For rare earths, where China holds ~90% of refining and ~94% of magnet production, the 40% processing target is the most ambitious.
The EU-Mercosur trade agreement creates preferential access for Brazilian rare-earth concentrates and processed materials — a structural commercial advantage for Brazilian producers selling into European markets.
May 2025: Lynas Rare Earths became the first company outside China to produce commercial quantities of separated dysprosium oxide. Malaysian NdPr capacity upgraded to 10,500 t/yr. New Texas refinery scheduled for commissioning. Lynas is the template for a non-Chinese heavy-rare-earth supply chain.