A Whole-Stack Move in Critical Minerals & Metals: A Shift Toward a Semiconductor-Like Industry (LIFTT)

Summary

• Projected supply at 2035 covers only 70% of expected copper demand, 61% of lithium, and 85–89% of nickel, cobalt and graphite.p.2
• China refines roughly 60% of the world's lithium and cobalt, more than 90% of its rare earths, and over 95% of battery-grade graphite.p.4
• On 3 February 2026 Washington launched Project Vault, a $2 billion private and $10 billion Ex-Im-backed strategic stockpile of critical minerals.p.5
• The 2026 annual copper treatment charge benchmark settled at $0/t, and early-2026 spot rates went below −$70/t.p.8
• Across the global base, 16.2% of smelter capacity sat inactive through the first seven months of 2024, against 13.9% the year before.p.9
• KoBold Metals raised $537 million in Series C in January 2025 at a $2.96 billion valuation.p.10
• General Motors holds a $650 million equity stake in Lithium Americas' Thacker Pass project, the largest direct investment by an automaker in mineral production.p.10

Key insights

1. In 2024 demand for lithium grew nearly 30% yet prices fell, but the picture inverts a decade out with a projected supply deficit.p.2
2. Copper closed 2025 at record highs, up almost 40%, and NdPr oxide is up more than 100% from a year ago.p.3
3. Chinese state-backed smelting capacity expanded by roughly 2.5 million tonnes per year between 2023 and 2025, faster than global mine output.p.9
4. Venture capital in critical minerals has moved from exploration to process technology such as extraction chemistry, autonomous operations and refining outside China.p.8
5. Refining outside China is structurally 30 to 50% more expensive on a unit-cost basis.p.12
6. Beijing's one-year suspension of export controls on rare earths, gallium, germanium and antimony expires on 27 November 2026.p.13
7. Rare Earths Norway has revised the Fen complex resource estimate to roughly 15.9 million tonnes of rare-earth oxides, with about €1 billion of upfront investment planned.p.5
8. In the mid-2030s scenario, recycling supplies between 15 and 25 percent of base-metal demand for most non-iron critical minerals.p.15