Highlights
- Global commodity traders like Traxys, Glencore, and Thyssenkrupp are entering the rare earth trading space, bringing capital and sophisticated services to a historically opaque market projected to triple to $30 billion by 2030.
- North American rare earth brokers range from Western agents for Chinese suppliers like Hefa Rare Earth Canada to independent full-service firms like G.E. Chaplin that operate across the entire value chain from mining to end products.
- Industry momentum is building toward greater market transparency through price assessments, potential futures exchanges, and platforms like REEx, aiming to create a secure non-Chinese supply chain for critical technologies.
Rare earth elements (REEs) are vital for technologies from electric vehicles to defense systems, yet the path from mine to manufacturer is anything but straightforward. Behind the scenes, a little-known network of traders and brokers quietly “greases the wheels” of the supply chain as Rare Earth Exchanges has elucidated. While mining companies and magnet makers grab headlines, these intermediaries bridge the gap – connecting upstream producers to downstream users – by arranging deals, securing transport, and even financing shipments of these critical materials. In North America, as elsewhere, rare earth brokers have been crucial in navigating a historically opaque market dominated by Chinese supply. They ensure that manufacturers get the right rare earth oxides, metals, or alloys on time, often acting as unsung enablers of the high-tech economy.
Global Traders Turn to Rare Earths
In recent years, major commodity trading houses have started treating rare earths as strategic commodities. Traxys, a Luxembourg-based firm with global offices (including the U.S.), has emerged as a key conduit in rare earth trading. Traxys (opens in a new tab) specializes in sourcing and logistics for metals, and it inked a notable deal to market Australian producer Arafura’s neodymium-praseodymium (NdPr) oxide output – essentially aggregating supply and selling it to magnet manufacturers who can’t commit to long-term contracts. Traders like Traxys provide services few others can, from offtake agreements and warehousing to trade financing and price hedging. This one-stop intermediary role helps junior rare earth miners find buyers and mitigates risks for end-users outside China.
As reported by REEx, seeing an opportunity, other big players are circling. Glencore (opens in a new tab) (Metals & Minerals), better known for base metals, and oil-focused Gunvor Group (opens in a new tab) have been rumored to be evaluating moves into rare earth trading. Even energy traders like Mercuria (opens in a new tab) (primarily through its investments in and partnerships with other companies, such as TechMet and REEtec, and its expanding role in commodity trading) and Vitol (opens in a new tab) (recently hiring metals experts as it looks to expand its business into critical minerals, which includes exploring opportunities in rare earth elements) are inching into critical minerals as electric vehicle demand surges.
Meanwhile, established metallurgical firms such as Germany’s Thyssenkrupp (opens in a new tab) have signed exclusive ten-year contracts to market output from rare earth mines in Africa and Australia. Japan’s general trading companies (e.g., Sojitz, Sumitomo) also stepped in after China’s 2010 export embargo, investing in projects like Lynas to secure non-Chinese supply for the Japanese industry. The entrance of these large traders brings capital and sophisticated services to a market that has long been small, thinly traded, and opaque. With forecasts that the rare earth market’s value could triple to over $30 billion by 2030 amid clean energy and defense demand, traders are jostling to become the “Goldman Sachs of rare earths”– positioning themselves as indispensable brokers of a growing commodity.
North America’s Rare Earth “Agents” and Middlemen
Within the United States and Canada, a handful of specialized firms function as rare earth brokers – often effectively acting as Western agents for Chinese producers. A notable example is Hefa Rare Earth Canada (opens in a new tab), based in British Columbia, which serves as an overseas arm of a Chinese supplier and has even been cited as a source of price information. As REEx chronicled, Hefa Canada was set up to better serve North American buyers and, at one point, to help skirt Chinese export quotas by holding inventory offshore. Similarly, companies like Stanford Materials Corp (opens in a new tab). (California) and its affiliate Stanford Advanced Materials (opens in a new tab) market themselves as global suppliers of rare earth metals and alloys. In business since the 1990s, these firms import rare earth oxides, metals, and even magnets – primarily from Chinese manufacturers – and resell them to U.S. and European customers in sectors like defense, electronics, and research.
In effect, at least some of these intermediaries operate as Western storefronts for Chinese output, navigating the logistics, customs, and customer service in local time zones. Industry insiders note there are myriad such intermediaries quietly handling Chinese rare earth magnet and alloy sales into North America and Europe, allowing buyers to deal with a local company even if the material origin is abroad. REEx is aware of at least several other specialized, niche players.
Many of these North American brokers serve “retail” needs in the sense that they fill smaller orders or niche requirements. For instance, Stanford Materials openly offers rare earth products via catalogs and websites, catering to research labs or specialty manufacturers who might need a few kilograms of high-purity oxide or alloy. On the other end, more “institutional” brokers handle large-volume contracts between mining companies and major end-users. The lines can blur – the same firm might supply a university lab with grams of europium and also broker tons of neodymium for a defense contractor – but all play a role in connecting supply to demand. Crucially, these brokers enable Western buyers to access Chinese-origin material with fewer headaches. By dealing with import paperwork, quality checks, and warehousing, they lower the barrier for companies in the U.S. or Canada to procure rare earths, which historically have been produced almost entirely in China.
Profile: G.E. Chaplin – A Veteran U.S. Rare Earth Broker
Not all North American rare earth dealers are simply pass-through agents for Chinese suppliers. G.E. Chaplin, Inc (opens in a new tab). stands out as a long-running U.S.-based trader that has woven itself into the global rare earth supply chain. Established in 1988 as a family-owned specialty chemicals and metals supplier, G.E. Chaplin entered the rare earth space in 1999 and over the past decades has developed a presence across the full spectrum of the rare earth value chain. The company has been involved at every stage – from mining and recycling of rare earth materials, to processing (concentrate production, separation, metallization), and finally the sale of finished rare earth products to industrial end-users in some cases tied to U.S. government business. In other words, G.E. Chaplin doesn’t just broker deals; it often partners in production and processing, collaborating with industry players “every step of the way” to get rare earths out of the ground and into finished components.
Headquartered in New Jersey with warehousing and regional offices throughout the U.S. and Europe, G.E. Chaplin today focuses on marketing, sourcing, and even producing a diverse portfolio of rare earth products (as well as complementary critical metals like cobalt and nickel). It serves as a single source for an array of materials – from rare earth ores and concentrates to oxides, metals, alloys, and even scrap – supplying industries ranging from permanent magnets and catalysts to aerospace, oil & gas, water treatment, medical imaging, and defense.
This broad reach means a U.S. magnet maker or a Department of Defense contractor can turn to G.E. Chaplin for everything from magnet-grade neodymium-praseodymium oxide to dysprosium metal powder, knowing the company can handle the procurement and quality vetting. G.E. Chaplin’s team touts decades of technical and market expertise, which helps them offer “unique solutions” in what have traditionally been opaque, illiquid markets. The firm’s longevity and network have even earned it a role in industry groups – in 2023, G.E. Chaplin became a member of the global Rare Earth Industry Association, reflecting its commitment to a sustainable and secure rare earth supply chain.
Companies like G.E. Chaplin exemplify how an independent North American broker can thrive by diversifying across the rare earth ecosystem. REEx is aware of other firms similar to G.E. Chaplain. Small niche yet influential players that facilitate supply chain-related deals.
North America’s rare earth traders aren’t monolithic – they range from tiny distributors to full-service firms deeply embedded in the supply chain.
Toward a More Transparent Market
For decades, rare earth trading was a fragmented world of private deals and opaque pricing. Transactions were often brokered behind closed doors, with prices referenced to industry newsletters or Chinese indexes, and little in the way of public market data. Today, momentum is building to bring more transparency and structure to this market. Media companies from Argus Media to REEx have begun initiatives to track and report on REE price assessments for dozens of products, creating reference points outside of China (the “ex-China” market).
There are even calls to establish a formal rare earth exchange or futures trading system. Industry voices (including the team behind REEx) have floated the idea of an “LME for rare earths” – a London Metal Exchange (opens in a new tab)-style platform to allow open trading and hedging of rare earth materials. As John Parkinson, Chief Business Officer of REEx, put it: “the race is on to build the ‘LME or Goldman Sachs of rare earths’ – a transparent, well-capitalized trading system to support a non-Chinese supply chain”. But a confluence of factors and forces must converge for this to happen anytime soon.
The push for transparency goes hand-in-hand with Western governments’ efforts to build an independent supply chain. As new rare earth separation plants and magnet factories are planned in the U.S., Canada, and allied countries, brokers and traders are adapting. Some are likely to create consortia or digital marketplaces to connect these new Western suppliers with buyers, reducing reliance on bespoke contracts.
In fact, the REEx platform itself is part of this evolution – aiming to provide “real-time news, industry insights”, forums for market participants, and even a specific ex-China modeled ETF (powered by REEx), in hopes of accelerating an ex-China REE market with “transformational transparency”. The end goal is a more open and liquid market where a U.S. electric vehicle maker, for instance, could procure neodymium magnet material at transparent prices and with assured provenance, rather than navigating the current opaque intermediary-driven sector.
Brokers Remain Indispensable
Even as the rare earth industry becomes more structured in North America---and REEx continues to help disrupt the space with transparency, the role of brokers and traders remains indispensable. They are the connective tissue that binds together a complex supply chain. From securing offtake deals that help new mines get financed, to stockpiling material in times of shortage, to arranging toll processing across borders – these intermediaries make the rare earth world turn. In an ideal future, a more mature market with exchanges and clear prices might simplify some transactions. But given the geopolitical sensitivities and technical complexities of rare earths, trusted brokers will likely always have a job managing the details: verifying quality, handling export/import regulations, and customizing deals to fit unique client needs.
North America’s rare earth brokers, whether giant commodity houses, sophisticated intermediary services, or value-added small specialty consultancies, have historically operated in the shadows. Now, as the U.S. and its allies strive to reduce dependence on China’s supply, these brokers are stepping into a more public role. They are expanding non-Chinese supply chains and enabling new entrants to find customers. REEx’s Parkinson states, “And we are on a mission to keep driving more transparency and insights for investors. Meaning REEx will be identifying, tracking, and collecting more data about these groups where and when feasible.” In a very real sense, the quiet brokers are becoming key players in North America’s critical metals strategy – the hidden hands guiding a once-murky market toward a more secure and transparent future.
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Aren’t these the types of companies which will be adversely affected by China’s new extra-territorial rules?