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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;Peter T Davis, post: 1995038, member: 1&quot;]It is an interesting area of speculation.&nbsp; I bought a bunch of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rare-earth_magnet" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rare-earth_magnet" rel="nofollow">rare earth magnets</a>, just because they&#039;re fun and the kids like them.&nbsp; I wouldn&#039;t consider them an investment though.&nbsp; They&#039;re commercially available, though a bit expensive.&nbsp; When I was reading about them I found out that for the most part <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rare_earth_element" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rare_earth_element" rel="nofollow">rare earth elements</a> aren&#039;t really &quot;rare&quot; like precious metals.&nbsp; The problem is that you don&#039;t find them in concentrated form, like we do with gold for example where there are specific areas you can mine and get it in quantity.&nbsp; So the process of mining rare earths is quite different, requiring huge areas to be excavated and by the sheer volume of the materials gone through, trace amounts of the rare earths become commercially viable amounts.&nbsp; So, the reason China has become a significant producer is that their government doesn&#039;t seem to care about the destruction done to the environment.&nbsp; In the USA, Canada, or other large western nations, we can get away with taking a single mountain for its coal, or some small areas for gold mines, etc.&nbsp; So, an area where there is a heavy concentration of rare earths, like Bayan Obo in China for example, if you google for images of it, you&#039;ll see stuff reminiscent of lunar landscapes. There are areas in the USA and other countries where the rare earths are probably as heavily concentrated as in China, in the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mountain_Pass_rare_earth_mine" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mountain_Pass_rare_earth_mine" rel="nofollow">Clark Mountains</a> for example.&nbsp; But, the combination of environmental concerns, regulations, cost of labor, etc, make it economically unviable for mining ventures.&nbsp; The problem I have with looking at it as an investment is that I believe eventually there will be new processes innovated that take much of the pain and expense out of mining, so holding rare earths for the long term I don&#039;t think is that great.&nbsp; Playing the futures market, on the other hand, could be extremely lucrative (or could bankrupt you on the other hand), if you can play on the instability of the economy, China&#039;s political situations, and so on.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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