Rare earth metals as an investment are still a relatively new niche of the market. The rare earth market is not dominated by a simple supply and demand equation. The start-up period for companies specializing in exploring, developing, mining, and processing the metals is a long time in the works, according to The Business Insider.
“So it will not be economic logic that results in these companies getting bought out and having their deposits developed. It’ll be strategic logic linked to long-term security-of-supply and redundancy concerns,” John Kaiser, online editor of Kaiser Research, said. “And were seeing that sort of psychology at work in this market. It’s a bit of a niche in this market. Not as big as gold, but it is an interesting one because of the long term real economy link implications.”
Market Vectors Rare Earth/ Strategic Metals
Tisha Guerrero contributed to this article.