China's antimony export controls rattle the tungsten industry

cnbc.com:

BEIJING — China's latest export controls has rattled insiders of the critical minerals industry, and some are concerned that Beijing will leverage its global supply chain dominance in unprecedented ways.

China's Ministry of Commerce announced Thursday that export controls on antimony would take effect Sept. 15. Antimony is used in bullets, nuclear weapons production and lead-acid batteries. It can also strengthen other metals.

«Three months ago, there's no way [any] one would have thought they would have done this. It's quite confrontational in that regard,» Lewis Black, CEO of Canada-based Almonty Industries, said in a phone interview. The company has said it's spending at least $125 million to reopen a tungsten mine in South Korea later this year.

Tungsten is nearly as hard as a diamond, and used in weapons, semiconductors and industrial cutting machines. Both tungsten and antimony are on the U.S. critical minerals list, and less than 10 elements away from each other on the periodic table.

«My sector is now thinking this is getting much closer to home than graphite,» Black said, referring to China's previous export controls. Last year, Beijing, the world's largest graphite producer, said it would enforce export permits for the crucial battery material amid scrutiny from foreign countries worried about its dominance.

«I can't explain this move and I think that's what rattled a lot of people in this sector, my customers, and they don't have a plan B, which China is very aware of. There hasn't been one for 30 years,» he said.

«There's always been an equilibrium… they were never weaponized because they could create this snowball of escalation,» he said.

China accounted for 48% of global antimony mine production in 2023,