Digging Into The Rare Earths And EVs Rush With Don Lay

The Razor’s Edge

The 2020-21 bull market has seen many familiar themes recycled amidst a very liquid public market environment. The rare earths market, and its flag bearer Molycorp, may not have been the most obvious boom to re-emerge, but here we are. Molycorp's descendant, MP Materials, came public via a SPAC last year and is trading at a higher valuation than the legacy company ever did.

To break down the recent moves and what it means, we speak with Don Lay, VP of Corporate Development at Medallion Resources, a rare earths technology company based in Canada. Don was previously CEO of the company and has a lot of firsthand experience to share. We go through the ins and outs of this story, including China’s market position, the import of electrification in cars, and how MP Materials is back on the scene.

Topics Covered

• 3:15 minute mark - Background on Don as well as MP and rare earths boom
• 8:45 - The Senkaku Islands incident
• 12:00 - Processing the rare earth minerals and the market power there
• 15:30 - Where China’s competitive edge comes from and Lynas's role in the industry
• 24:00 - The challenges of developing a greenfield rare earths project
• 26:30 - Demand for rare earths
• 30:30 - The end of the internal combustion engine
• 35:30 - Explaining MP Materials’ revival
• 41:30 - Where is the market power in rare earths
• 46:00 - How the rare earths market might evolve
• 51:00 - Where electric and hybrid vehicle demand goes and what it means
• 55:00 - How the EV frenzy affect operations for rare earth miners
• 1:00:00 - How this compares to past bubbles
• 1:03:00 - Tesla's position
• 1:08:00 - Background on Medallion
• 1:14:00 - The environmental costs