Niron breaks ground on rare earth-free magnet manufacturing plant in Minnesota
Zijin becomes world’s No. 3 miner after reaching $100B valuation
Mercuria pares vast aluminum bet that’s roiled market for months
Appian secures $150M for Namibia zinc mine expansion
Argentina approves McEwen’s $2.7B copper project for tax break program
Congo seeks to tap more gold with new mines amid soaring prices
Niron breaks ground on rare earth-free magnet manufacturing plant in Minnesota
Niron Magnetics broke ground Friday on a new 1,500-ton-per-year permanent magnet manufacturing facility in Sartell, Minnesota.
After nearly a decade of research and development in partnership with the US Department of Energy (DOE) and the University of Minnesota, Niron said it has successfully created one of the first commercially viable new magnet materials in decades, capable of producing superior permanent magnets.
Privately-held Niron said its product does not contain any rare earth elements, and are made from abundant elements such as iron and nitrogen.
Rendering from Niron Magnetics
The company highlighted that it is able to scale manufacturing of permanent magnets made from iron nitride, which exhibits exceptionally high magnetization and removes the need for rare earth elements.
Investors and commercial partners including Stellantis, Samsung, Allison Transmission, Magna and others are already sampling products from the company’s pilot facility, it said.
The new 190,000-square-foot facility will expand Niron’s capacity to supply rare-earth-free permanent magnets for data center cooling pumps, automobile motors, robotics, consumer electronics, defense and drone equipment, and other applications critical to the US economy.
The facility will be built on the former Verso Paper Mill site, redeveloping a US designated coal community property.
The development comes at a critical time, as pressure on rare earth supply chains intensifies due to geopolitical tensions and rising demand for permanent magnets globally.
“We’re proud to scale this homegrown technology in the heart of the industrial Midwest, and excited to make this community central to America’s supply chain independence,” Niron CEO Jonathan Rowntree said in a news release.
The plant will be operational in early 2027 and will create over 175 full-time jobs in manufacturing, engineering and operations, the company said.
“Permanent magnets are an essential part of modern vehicles, the heart of the performance for everything from powertrains and cooling systems to seat motors and speakers. We are committed to offering the freedom of choice to our customers and the integration of these magnets is critical to that mission,” said Sinisa Jurkovic, Stellantis VP, propulsion systems engineering.
Zijin becomes world’s No. 3 miner after reaching $100B valuation
China’s Zijin Mining Group (HKG: 2899) has become the world’s third-largest mining company by value after surpassing $100 billion in market capitalization for the first time at Thursday’s close.
The milestone places Zijin alongside global heavyweights BHP (ASX: BHP) and Rio Tinto (ASX: RIO), which closed Thursday with market values of A$212 billion ($140 billion) and A$169 billion ($111 billion), respectively.
La Arena copper-gold mine in Peru
On Thursday, Zijin’s Shanghai shares hit a record high, lifting its market capitalization to 732 billion yuan ($103 billion). With this, it took the No. 3 spot globally from Glencore (LON: GLEN), which has a market capitalization of £39.76 billion ($53 billion).
The surge comes amid record gold prices and copper’s strongest year on record, which together generated 77% of Zijin’s first-half revenue. The stock has more than doubled in 2025, with gold setting fresh records and copper on track for its best year ever in terms of average prices.
From one mine to global player
Founded in the 1980s by geologist and current chairman Chen Jinghe, Zijin grew from a small gold mine in southeastern China into a sprawling global player. The company now controls or holds majority stakes in hundreds of operations worldwide. In the past few years, it added Serbia’s largest copper mine, Kazakhstan’s Raygorodok gold mine (pending), and Ghana’s Akyem gold mine to its portfolio.
Mercuria pares vast aluminum bet that’s roiled market for months
Mercuria Energy Group has pulled back from a giant aluminum trade that drew scrutiny from the London Metal Exchange, according to people familiar with the matter.
The energy trader had built up a huge position in aluminum on the LME earlier this year, in part as a bet that a peace deal to end the war in Ukraine could lead to a relaxation of sanctions against Russian metals.
But in recent weeks Mercuria has relinquished the majority of its dominant position in aluminum inventories on the LME, according to the people, who asked not to be identified because of the commercial sensitivity of the matter.
The aluminum market has been rocked by the arrival of Mercuria and other large energy traders this year, with their efforts to scoop up inventories threatening to crimp availability for other buyers. Spot prices have softened relative to futures as Mercuria has trimmed its position in recent days, in a sign that supply conditions on the LME are improving.
Data from the LME show that one trader consistently held over 80% of the available stocks of aluminum from mid-July until mid-September; that trader was Mercuria, the people said.
However, since mid-September, the position has shifted, with Mercuria releasing much of the Russian inventory it was holding, and maintaining a position principally in non-Russian aluminum, the people said. According to exchange data, 228,000 tons of the aluminum on the LME was of Russian origin as of the end of August, with almost all of the remaining 241,000 tons being Indian.
The move means that Mercuria is no longer a dominant holder of aluminium inventories, with its position now below levels that would require disclosure to the LME. Last week, exchange data briefly showed two large positions in inventories and nearby contracts, and since then one trader has held a position equivalent to 50-80% of LME stocks. The remaining dominant position is held by rival trader Trafigura Group, not Mercuria, the people said.
Appian secures $150M for Namibia zinc mine expansion
Rosh Pinah zinc mine in southern Namibia.
Appian Capital Advisory has secured a $150 million debt facility from Standard Bank to complete the expansion of its majority-owned Rosh Pinah zinc mine (RPZ) in southern Namibia.
The financing will cover the remaining construction costs of the Rosh Pinah 2.0 project (RP2.0), which is more than 80% complete and on track for full commissioning in the third quarter of 2026. The expansion aims to nearly double throughput to 1.3 million tonnes a year, equal to about 170 million pounds of zinc.
The project includes developing additional underground deposits and building new surface facilities, including a processing plant, paste fill and water treatment plant, and a new portal and decline.
“Securing this financing is a major step forward for RPZ and RP2.0,” Ignacio Bustamante, Appian’s head of base metals, said in a statement. “The expansion is a key component of our strategy to optimise operations and extend mine life.”
Alex Mayrick, the mine’s general manager, said Standard Bank’s involvement reflected confidence in the long-term prospects of the operation.
Solar-powered
About 30% of the mine’s energy needs are being met by the Rosh Pinah Solar Park, in which Appian took a controlling stake earlier this year. The plant supplies electricity at a fixed rate under a 15-year offtake agreement with Emesco Energy, cutting energy costs by 8%.
Appian plans to boost the solar plant’s capacity from 5.4MWp (megawatt peak) to 16.3MWp, with Emesco continuing as operator.
Argentina approves McEwen’s $2.7B copper project for tax break program
Argentina has approved Canadian miner McEwen Copper’s $2.7 billion Los Azules copper project in the country for a tax break program known as the Large Investment Incentive Regime (RIGI), the nation’s economy minister said on Friday.
The project is set to contribute $1.1 billion in exports a year, Economy Minister Luis Caputo said in a post on X. McEwen Copper is a subsidiary of McEwen Mining.
Argentina has not produced copper since its Alumbrera mine closed in 2018, but developers and analysts hope projects like Los Azules could make the South American nation a major global supplier.
Caputo said the approval marked a first for a copper mining proposal in San Juan province – Argentina’s leading gold mining region and a hub for so far non-operational copper projects – and would directly and indirectly create over 3,500 jobs.
Los Azules is the eighth project to be approved for the RIGI tax break scheme, bringing a total investment of $15.7 billion under the incentive plan promoted by the government of libertarian President Javier Milei.
Company sources told Reuters McEwen estimates the total investment for Los Azules, which towers 3,500 meters above sea level in the Andes mountain range, will reach $3 billion over three to four years.
The company must now seek financing for this investment, they said.
McEwen plans to produce copper cathodes in Argentina starting from 2029, and should soon publish a feasibility study showing operational details for the next 20 years while in the meantime it works to secure permits.
The mine is set to use a leaching copper extraction method rather than the traditional method of floating and skimming the concentrate, which the company expects will allow it to use five-sixths less water and reduce the impact on local residents.
Congo seeks to tap more gold with new mines amid soaring prices
Democratic Republic of Congo says it loses 60 tons of gold a year to smuggling. The new mines minister wants the country to build new sites to recapture that wealth.
Louis Watum, who became minister last month, previously developed Africa’s biggest gold mine at Kibali, now owned by Barrick Mining Corp. He sees more projects like it on the horizon.
“There’s a lot of talks in the pipeline and a few deals might be announced in the near future,” Watum told Bloomberg in an interview in New York Wednesday. “We are talking with not only existing big mining houses like Barrick. We open again space for newcomers as well.”
Despite the success of Kibali, Congo has struggled to develop gold assets in its conflict-ridden east. Traffickers and armed groups dominate the trade, much of which transits through neighboring Uganda and Rwanda to the United Arab Emirates. With the gold price near record highs, 60 tons of gold could be worth more than $7 billion, a transformative revenue source for a poor country.
Watum, who also developed Ivanhoe Mines Ltd.’s copper and zinc projects in Congo, is in talks with the US over a forthcoming minerals, infrastructure and security deal, which he said are “quite advanced.”
