As Americans wake up today they will learn that their President and First Lady have both tested positive for COVID-19 (coronavirus). This follows the other big news from the White House just two days earlier that an Executive Order has been issued declaring “a national emergency” to deal with the threat of a lack of critical minerals supply chain for the US. If we add in the debate earlier this week, it certainly has been a busy and bruising week for the White House.

With just one month to go to the US election on November 3, the White House has been thrown into chaos. US futures have reacted negatively and are down. President Trump has been criticized for his poor handling of the COVID-19 crisis that has now infected almost 7.5m Americans and killed 212,694. Now he is one of them. There is no doubt as many Americans still await a long delayed stimulus package many will have mixed feelings about today’s news. For investors they will be watching the fallout as markets open.

But there is a ray of sunshine for investors in critical materials companies. On September 30 The White House announced: “Executive Order on addressing the threat to the domestic supply chain from reliance on critical minerals from foreign adversaries.”

The U.S. List of 35 critical minerals include the following: (1) Aluminum (bauxite); (2) Antimony; (3) Arsenic; (4) Barite; (5) Beryllium; (6) Bismuth; (7) Cesium; (8) Chromium; (9) Cobalt; (10) Fluorspar; (11) Gallium; (12) Germanium; (13) Graphite (natural); (14) Hafnium; (15) Helium; (16) Indium; (17) Lithium; (18) Magnesium; (19) Manganese; (20) Niobium; (21) Platinum Group of Metals; (22) Potash; (23) The Rare Earth Elements Group: (Cerium, Dysprosium, Erbium, Europium, Gadolinium, Holmium, Lanthanum, Lutetium, Neodymium, Praseodymium, Promethium, Samarium, Terbium, Thulium, Ytterbium and Yttrium); (24) Rhenium; (25) Rubidium; (26) Scandium; (27) Strontium; (28) Tantalum; (29) Tellurium; (30) Tin; (31) Titanium; (32) Tungsten; (33) Uranium; (34) Vanadium and (35) Zirconium. The six underlined are those included in the ORE Act, which also seeks to secure US supply or these 6 critical materials.

Major US import sources of non-fuel mineral commodities – China dominates

Source: Courtesy US Geological Survey

The key points of the September 30 President Trump critical minerals Executive Order are:

• The US’s undue reliance on critical minerals, in processed or unprocessed form, from foreign adversaries constitutes an unusual and extraordinary threat. “I (President Trump) hereby declare a national emergency to deal with that threat.”
• “By expanding and strengthening domestic mining and processing capacity today, we guard against the possibility of supply chain disruptions and future attempts by our adversaries or strategic competitors to harm our economy and military readiness.”

In response to the threat President Trump proposes several measures to be taken with different time frames ranging from 30 to 60 days from September 30, 2020.

The Executive Order says the US Gov. will look into giving “grants to procure or install production equipment for the production and processing of critical minerals in the United States”, “loan guarantees” and for projects that support domestic supply chains “funding awards and loans pursuant to the Advanced Technology Vehicles Manufacturing incentive program.”

For investors in the critical minerals mining sector this is good news and very welcome. The main winners so far have been the US or Canadian based critical minerals companies or those that can help supply the USA with critical minerals. Some examples have been Lithium Americas (lithium), Westwater Resources (graphite), most of the rare earths companies, and most of the electric vehicle (EV) metal miners.

InvestorIntel Rare Earths Watchlist Top 5 from October 1, 2020

Source

The Tesla Battery Day revelations now mean that the EV revolution will rapidly accelerate. Tesla plans to have 3TWh of battery capacity by 2030, which will be enough for Tesla to make 20 million (m) EVs per year plus energy storage products. To get a feel for the demand shock wave to hit EV metal miners, if Tesla produces 20m EVs in 2030 that will require 2.7m tonnes of lithium carbonate equivalent (LCE), which is 9x total 2019 global supply. Wow!

Investing in the critical materials miners and other parts of the supply chain to support the US this decade, as the world rapidly moves to renewable energy and EVs, just got a HUGE boost.

Now we wait and see what happens next with President and Lady Trump, the US election, and the COVID-19 pandemic. No-one can say that 2020 has been a boring year!

This morning I raced through Fallon, Kimmel, Corden and Colbert as I do every morning with a cup of coffee. The idea? Hit the ground running having enjoyed the late-night talk show hosts translations of the news events from the day before…

Henry Weingarten doesn’t understand why I cannot commit to a follow up interview, he’s right – we need one. After all, in our last interview he forecasted everything from who will win the Presidential election to a bullish graphite, gold and media market this Fall. Undoubtedly we would all like to know what percentage of forecasts he is making on our capital markets that are right and which ones are wrong. Alright, we will get this done and live by next week.

Reviewing the emails, Russell Fryer of Critical Metals PLC (LON: CRTM) alerted many of this AM to the Executive Order on Addressing the Threat to the Domestic Supply Chain from Reliance on Critical Minerals from Foreign Adversaries that was published on the White House site yesterday.

Russell adds in his email: “The use of the term ‘foreign adversaries’ is quite a strong phrase, designed and inserted to call out China…” He then adds his summary points of interest:

1. the United States develops secure critical minerals supply chains that do not depend on resources or processing from foreign adversaries. (i.e. China)
2. the United States develops globally competitive, substantial, and resilient domestic commercial supply chain capabilities for critical minerals mining and processing.
3. reduce the vulnerability of the United States to the disruption of critical mineral supply chains through cooperation and coordination with partners and allies, including the private sector
4. build resilient critical mineral supply chains, including through initiatives to help allies build reliable critical mineral supply chains within their own territories

OK, thanks Russell and kudos on listing Critical Metals PLC in London earlier this week, we are all watching to see what you do next.

Now Trump? While the content of this Executive Order is unquestionably of great interest to me and my associates in this sector, why wasn’t Trump busy investing in how to clean up his post debate mess is of great interest to me. Experts tell me that the positive he is doing for critical materials will continue no matter who becomes President this Fall, but it does makes it hard to communicate what I deem to be a very positive action on his behalf when he is not behaving like a gentleman.

For the record, talkative is fine. After all, rare earths’ experts are exceptionally talkative….

In fact, I was speaking with Jack Lifton earlier this last week and asked him about a new editorial candidate for InvestorIntel to do a regular column on our sector, and his response to one candidate was “he’s good, but if you ask him the time, he will give you the history of how time was created.”

My point? Give us Trump for the Technology Metals Show and I will have no challenge being the moderator with Jack Lifton as I am used to strong driven communicators with passionate positions on why we should all be buying their stock. On that note I would like to personally extend an invitation for President Trump to be on the Technology Metals Show and have Jack Lifton interview him on this Executive Order?

Now why will this work? It will work, because we are all on the same side here…when it comes to our North American issues around sustainability, we all agree. No one should ever be solely reliant on one nation for all of our Technology Metals.

See a theme here?

Before I change the point here, yes, I do plan on asking Ron Wortel to write a piece on this order ASAP. Why Ron? Well in a conversation with Ron yesterday in discussions about him taking on a regular moderator role of a critical materials editorial board (this clever idea was suggested to me by Jeff Green and his team at J.A. Green & Company last week). Ron was discussing his history in rare earths, and you know what? I think he can do it and do it well. Ron’s style is understated and many of us enjoy reading well done text that is written by knowledgeable professionals that understand the business…you will of course tell me what you think – you always do.

Alright, I am running to go assist Raj Shah on putting together a Top 20 InvestorChannel Watchlist of graphite companies today. Would like to thank Julie Pacquet of Nouveau Monde Graphite Inc. (TSXV: NOU | OTCQX: NMGRF) for being the catalyst of this idea.

On a final note I am going to start calling out ‘flags on the field’ of the capital markets and today I would like to highlight an analyst who did what I deemed a ‘smackdown’ on another rare earths company in an eblast I received yesterday. Let me add, I have grown weary of advising him that his content is not my friend and have been unsuccessfully and getting off of his darn list, but hey this is simple.

How can you call out other critical material company when you sit on Boards and are presently raising funds for your own company (in the same sector of course)? When are we as investors simply going to build a wall for you and insist that you not climb over it? Consider this my brick, and as I have told you before – why can you not just market yourself without tearing someone else down, especially when you do not know what is going on.

It seems we have analysts that could use a brush up on professional behavior as well.

Enjoy your day, we will get Mr Weingarten set up for an interview, finish the InvestorChannel Graphite Watchlist, and attempt to get the news release written on the new Investor Talks video meeting series and in your inbox by Friday afternoon.

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