BMO Metals Brief

Research evidence excerpt

BMO Metals Brief

rding to a

4,200

White House fact sheet on the US-China summit published yesterday. The release also states that

China will address U.S. concerns regarding prohibitions or restrictions on the sale of rare earth 4,000

production and processing equipment and technologies; however, China's Ministry of Commerce 3,800

made no mention of rare earths in its own summary published on Saturday. Rare earth exports 18 Feb 18 Mar 18 Apr 18 May

from China to the USA are improving although Beijing is still slow to approve some shipments,

Source: Bloomberg, BMO Capital Markets with US trade representative Jamieson Greer saying in an interview last week that China “still

drags its feet with some export licenses”.

 Trump rolls back auto pollution rules: Yesterday the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Spot Iron Ore

proposed a delay in enforcement of a Biden-era regulation, which would have required 115

significant cuts in air pollution from vehicle fleets, reports Reuters. The rule would have required

car manufacturers to achieve a 50% reduction from 2027 to 2032 of pollutants including carbon

monoxide and NOx and follows a pattern of deregulation in the US auto industry in the past year 110

including the reduction of fuel economy requirements and the removal of fuel economy penalties

for automakers. We see this as bearish for US EV sales and conversely bullish for PGM demand in

the US auto sector. 105 $/tonne

 Stronger weekly iron ore, weaker coal shipments: Latest high frequency preliminary shipping

data shows Australian coal shipments retreated 20% w/w to 7.1Mt (also -18% y/y) last week, 100

as both met coal and thermal coal volumes declined sequentially. Meanwhile, Australian iron ore