China alone accounts for 97 percent of the rare earth metal market.

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And some colleagues who intend to start producing 60 tonnes a year of a rare earth metal when then current market is perhaps 5.

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Neodymium is a rare earth metal used extensively to produce permanent magnets found in everything from computer hard disks and cell phones to wind turbines and cars.

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Exactly what is a rare earth metal is very slightly arguable, some would say it is only the lanthanides, lanthanum, cerium through to lutetium in that little box at the bottom of the periodic table.

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The threads running through all of this are price and scarcity: a price to signal the relative scarcity of a good such as a rare-earth metal, and that relative scarcity in turn to stimulate innovation.

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In the commodity world the momentum has been found in such areas as rare earth, precious metal, coals and uranium however the steel names have not performed as one would expect.

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