Nomi Prins — Houston, We Have A Tungsten Problem
Tungsten is up ~900% in 12 months on Chinese export controls, U.S. defense law and a July 13 White House deadline — and the recent dip is a buying window, not a top.
One-line take: tungsten — the hardest, highest-melting-point metal, essential for drill bits, armor-piercing rounds, missile/drone components and chip interconnects — has been repriced ~900% in a year (from ~$350/mtu a year ago and ~$850 in Dec 2025 to ~$3,000-3,280 now, vs a stable 20-year range of $250-400). China mines ~82% of global output and has steadily tightened exports (licensing Feb 2025, a Key Export Supervision Catalog Oct 2025, only 15 authorized exporters for 2026-27, and a ban on military-use exports to Japan). The Pentagon's procurement ban extends to the entire upstream chain from Jan 1, 2027, and a July 13 Section 232 report can only add tariffs/price-floors/quotas. Prins reads the recent ~14% pullback as a buying window inside the most bullish setup in two decades. Note: the specific tungsten-producer pick is reserved for the next Pulse Premium issue, so no single buy recommendation is captured here.
1. Stocks & names mentioned
This is a top-down commodity thesis — no individual security is named in the article; the producer pick is paywalled. The only tradable reference is tungsten itself. "View" reflects how it was framed. The "At" link opens the article.
| Ticker | Name | Research | View | What she said | At |
|---|
| Tungsten (APT) | Tungsten | — | Positive | Repriced ~900% in 12 months on Chinese export controls + U.S. defense law; can't be substituted, mined fast enough or imported meaningfully outside China. The July 13 Section 232 report "has no bearish outcome," and the ~14% dip is a buying window inside the most bullish setup in two decades. | read |
Built from the article's free/public portion; Prins's specific tungsten-producer recommendation is reserved for the next Pulse Premium issue. "View" reflects how the commodity was framed, not a price rating.
2. Key points
China is the tungsten market
- China mined 67,000 of the 82,000 tons produced in 2024 (82% of output) and holds 53% of reserves; Vietnam (3,400t) and Russia (1,500t) are distant; every Western-aligned producer combined is ~3,110t (<5% of China). S&P Global concludes no meaningful new Western supply arrives before 2030 even if mines broke ground today — and Chinese ore grades have fallen from >0.5% to ~0.3%, tightening supply from within.
China tightened its grip on exports
- Feb 4, 2025: tungsten added to the export-control list (licenses required). Oct 26, 2025: added to the Key Export Supervision Catalog (quota reviews + approvals). Dec 30: only 15 companies authorized to export in 2026-27. Jan 6, 2026: exports of military-use tungsten products to Japan banned (Japan was 57% of Chinese APT exports in the first 11 months of 2025).
- Flows confirm the squeeze: Chinese APT exports fell from 782 tons (2024) to 243 tons (first 11 months of 2025, –69%); key tungsten-product exports hit effectively zero in March 2025; early-2026 volumes were down 27.6% YoY against an already-compressed base.
The Pentagon is closing the loopholes
- DoD already cannot buy tungsten produced in China, Russia, Iran or North Korea. From Jan 1, 2027, the rules apply to where tungsten is mined, refined or separated — the entire upstream chain — and the exemption for commercial off-the-shelf products ends for items ≥50% tungsten by weight. Within six months any tungsten-heavy defense component will need a fully non-Chinese/Russian/Iranian/N-Korean source.
- Demand is rising in parallel: semiconductor equipment sales forecast to climb $145B (2026) → $156B (2027) on AI build-out; Japanese chipmakers saw delivery cycles stretch from three to nine months; Germany's Leopard 2 KE2020Neo and the UK's Challenger 3 use tungsten-alloy penetrators.
The July 13 report can only be bullish
- Trump's Jan 14, 2026 proclamation ordered critical-minerals trade agreements with a 180-day report due July 13; tungsten is one of 50 minerals in scope. The four tools left to Commerce — tariffs, minimum import prices, quotas, or further Section 232 actions — are all bullish for U.S.-aligned producers. Officials have named tungsten for an allied trade bloc built on reference prices and price floors. The ~14% retracement is happening before the report lands.
Summary derived from the public (free) portion of the Prinsights Substack article for personal study. Not investment advice; the author's specific recommendation is paywalled. © Nomi Prins / Prinsights for source material.