Mining Press Roundup: USA Rare Earth Breaks Ground on $1.2B Magnet Plant as Copper's Record Rally Crashes Into Tariff Limbo

The biggest mining story this week isn't a drill result or a deal — it's dirt actually moving. USA Rare Earth broke ground on a $1.2 billion rare earth metal and magnet manufacturing facility in Blacksburg, South Carolina, a concrete step toward the "mine-to-magnet" domestic supply chain Washington has been chasing for years. It lands the same week copper's blistering 2026 rally suddenly reversed on a stalled White House tariff decision, and as Glencore and Mercuria began circling a Venezuelan aluminum smelter that's been dormant since the country's worst power crises. Between rare earths, aluminum, nickel and copper, this roundup is a snapshot of critical-minerals policy colliding with market reality.

USA Rare Earth: Ground Broken on $1.2B South Carolina Magnet Plant

USA Rare Earth (Nasdaq: USAR) held a groundbreaking ceremony this week at its new rare earth metal and magnet manufacturing facility in Blacksburg, South Carolina, a project the company says marks an important milestone in USA Rare Earth's broader strategy to build and grow a secure, globally integrated rare earth value chain that reduces reliance on concentrated sources of supply.

The numbers are substantial for a single site: the roughly 800,000-square-foot facility on a 124-acre site in Bailey Industrial Park in Cherokee County represents an approximately $1.2 billion investment and is expected to create roughly 490 high-skill, high-wage manufacturing jobs in South Carolina's Upstate. Once running, the facility is targeting production capacity of 6,400 metric tons per annum of sintered neodymium-iron-boron permanent magnets and 5,000 tpa of strip-cast metal and alloy, with commissioning targeted to begin in 2028.

South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster attended the ceremony, calling it "another tremendous vote of confidence in our workforce and in the manufacturing future of our state." The company's chief global policy officer, Gregory Bowman, framed the plant as one link in a much longer chain, noting that "Blacksburg adds critical manufacturing capacity to that broader platform and brings the United States closer to producing more of the materials and magnets our industries depend on outside of Chinese control." NdFeB magnets — the neodymium-iron-boron permanent magnets that are tiny but extremely strong, used inside electric motors, wind turbines, hard drives and many consumer devices — remain almost entirely sourced from China today, which is precisely the dependency this plant is designed to chip away at. The Blacksburg site will complement USA Rare Earth's existing Stillwater, Oklahoma operation, giving the company two anchor points in a domestic magnet supply chain that, until recently, barely existed.

Glencore & Mercuria: Racing for Venezuela's Venalum Aluminum Smelter

Two of the world's largest commodity traders are now competing for access to Venezuela's flagship aluminum smelter. According to reporting cited by MINING.COM, trading giants are said to be exploring a deal that could revive Venalum after years of power shortages and underinvestment, with Venalum, located in Puerto Ordaz near hydroelectric power resources and bauxite reserves, having the capacity to produce about 430,000 metric tons of primary aluminum annually.

Mercuria is reportedly not going it alone: Mercuria is said to be partnering with Heeney Capital, a private mining investment firm, on the potential transaction, with the companies having previously worked together on deals in Venezuela to gain access to the country's commodities and metals. No deal has been signed yet, and no agreement has been reached and the talks could still collapse, according to Bloomberg.

The stakes go beyond headline aluminum pricing. Traders competing for Venalum are really competing for control of physical supply and offtake rights — the ability to decide whether and how quickly to restart potlines, line up alumina and power arrangements, organize shipping, and use London Metal Exchange hedges to reduce the risk of price swings. Venalum's history is a cautionary tale for anyone underestimating the rebuild required: the smelter's production had crashed to a fraction of capacity after a nationwide power outage froze its pot lines, and any new operator inherits a facility that industry watchers have said may need a total rebuild rather than a patch job. Still, the underlying attributes that drew global producers to Venezuela decades ago — abundant hydropower, intact bauxite reserves and port facilities — remain intact, which is exactly why Glencore and Mercuria are willing to take the risk now that Western commodity houses are re-engaging with the country.

Talon Metals: Tamarack Ore Redirected to Michigan's Humboldt Mill

Talon Metals (TSX: TLO) scrapped its plan to build a standalone processing plant in North Dakota, opting instead to run future ore from its Minnesota Tamarack nickel-copper-cobalt project through its existing Humboldt Mill in Michigan. The company said the decision followed its evaluation of potential processing pathways for material from the Tamarack Nickel-Copper-Cobalt Project in central Minnesota, choosing its existing Humboldt Mill in Michigan as the processing location. That move effectively shelves the previously planned Beulah Minerals Processing Facility in North Dakota.

CEO Darby Stacey framed the pivot as a matter of using what the company already owns rather than building from scratch: "The Humboldt Mill gives us the opportunity to build on an existing U.S. processing facility with a proven operational and environmental track record and a highly experienced workforce," he said, adding that "as we evaluate the future development of the Tamarack Project, we see real value in making the best use of infrastructure we already own and maintaining skilled jobs and economic activity in Michigan." The mill itself is no experiment — the Humboldt Mill, located in Marquette County, Michigan, currently processes ore from Talon's wholly owned Eagle Mine using conventional flotation to produce separate nickel and copper concentrates, and has been operating continuously since commercial production at Eagle Mine began in 2014.

Talon says a feasibility study evaluating the switch, including required material handling and process modifications, is currently underway and expected to be completed by the end of the year, with the company set to coordinate with regulators in Minnesota and Michigan regarding the transition to Humboldt as the processing location. Industry group Mining Minnesota welcomed the update, with executive director Julie Lucas noting the pathway "would connect a world-class Minnesota mineral resource with an existing, operating U.S. processing facility" if Tamarack clears the state's environmental review.

MMG: EU Prepares Formal Objections Over Anglo American Nickel Deal

Brussels is turning up the pressure on MMG's bid to acquire Anglo American's Brazilian nickel assets. According to reporting, the European Commission plans to issue a statement of objections, or charge sheet, later this month, outlining concerns MMG would need to address to secure approval. The deal in question — MMG's agreement from February 2025 to acquire Anglo's Brazilian nickel business, including two ferronickel operations and two greenfield projects, done by a miner controlled by state-owned China Minmetals — has become a proxy fight over Europe's exposure to Chinese-controlled critical mineral supply.

Regulators' concern centers on ferronickel, a crucial stainless-steel input. The EC said in November that the acquisition could give MMG the ability to divert ferronickel supplies away from Europe, potentially weakening the competitiveness of the region's stainless steel producers. Anglo American has pushed back hard, arguing the transaction should be approved without conditions, pointing to an expansion in ferronickel supply from several producers and the ability of European customers to switch suppliers. The scrutiny isn't confined to Europe, either — Brazil's competition authority launched an investigation following a complaint by CoreX Holding, an industrial group and competitor in the region. The case is quickly becoming a bellwether for how far Western regulators are willing to go in blocking Chinese state-linked capital from critical mineral assets, even in jurisdictions like Brazil that badly want the investment.

Gemfields: $29.6M Emerald Auction Offers Cash Relief

Gemfields (LON: GEM; JSE: GML) got some breathing room this week after its first commercial-quality emerald auction in nine months came in strong. The company raised $29.6 million from its first commercial-quality emerald auction in nine months, offering some relief after a difficult year of production setbacks and strained cash flow. Every lot found a buyer: the coloured gemstones miner sold all 44 lots offered from its 75%-owned Kagem mine in Zambia at an average $9.72 per carat, in an auction that ran in India from Aug. 24 to Sept. 10.

Despite the clean sell-through, the market reaction was harsh — shares in Gemfields fell 13.5% on Friday to 2.51p despite the positive auction result, valuing the company at £1.07 billion ($1.5 billion). Management was encouraged nonetheless, with product and sales managing director Adrian Banks saying "it has been nine months since our last commercial-quality emerald auction and I am particularly encouraged by this robust result," adding that "viewing activity in Jaipur was intense throughout the auction, reflecting a high level of customer engagement." The result matters because Gemfields has spent the past year in retrenchment mode — the auction gives the company a welcome cash injection after disruptions at Kagem and its Montepuez ruby mine in Mozambique constrained production, and the company has been cutting costs and selling assets, including reducing group operating costs by 17% last year and selling luxury jewellery brand Fabergé for $50 million.

Copper & Silver: Record Rally Snaps on Tariff Limbo

The commodity story overshadowing everything else this week is copper's abrupt reversal. After setting records in four straight sessions, copper cratered on Thursday when Reuters reported that a US producer price report and crude oil above $105 a barrel pushed the odds of a Federal Reserve rate increase next week to about 70%, and a report that the White House copper tariff plan has stalled pulled the rug from under a metal that had set records in four straight sessions. Comex futures for December delivery fell as much as 5.4% to $6.5160 a pound in New York, a day after settling at a record $6.8885.

The damage to equities was severe and broad-based. Freeport-McMoRan closed down 6.59% and Teck Resources 6.31% on the day, after the report that the White House has not yet decided on refined copper tariffs sent copper and silver prices sharply lower and gold sliding. Silver was arguably hit even harder — silver's 5.5% drop was its worst single-day performance since June, leaving the metal down 9% cumulatively in 2026 after touching $121.64 in January. Per market data, copper miners (COPX) fell 7.0% day-over-day to close at $88.61, while silver dropped 5.6% to $63.45/oz — a stark reminder of how quickly a policy-driven premium can unwind. Analysts framed the move as unmasking just how much of copper's 2026 rally had been built on tariff speculation rather than fundamentals; as one energy metals analyst put it, the drop reflects the market "removing an assumed tariff-driven US price premium" and forcing valuations to reset around global benchmark pricing rather than an anticipated US premium, according to reporting from Energy Metal News.

What It Means

Today's press releases split cleanly into two stories the industry is telling itself simultaneously. On one side is the slow, deliberate build-out of Western critical-mineral independence — USA Rare Earth's groundbreaking, Talon's decision to lean on infrastructure it already owns rather than build fresh, and the EU's willingness to hold up an MMG-Anglo nickel deal over ferronickel access. These are multi-year bets that supply chains matter more than spot prices, and they're happening regardless of what copper or silver do on any given Thursday.

On the other side is a commodity market that just got a violent reminder of how much of 2026's rally has been priced on policy anticipation rather than physical tightness. Copper's snap-back and silver's worst single-day drop since June show how fragile tariff-driven premiums can be the moment Washington hesitates. Meanwhile, capital continues to chase distressed or dormant assets wherever it can find them — Glencore and Mercuria angling for a broken Venezuelan smelter, Gemfields squeezing cash out of a gem market that's held up better than its share price suggests. The common thread: strategic minerals policy is now moving on its own timeline, increasingly decoupled from the volatility roiling the metals traded against it day to day.

This roundup covers press releases published on September 11, 2026. Company announcements are sourced from mining industry wire services. For corrections or updates, contact contact@stakeandpaper.com.