Tungsten supply chain

Tungsten is now China's second weaponised critical mineral after antimony

Beijing's February 2025 export controls on tungsten products - including ammonium paratungstate (APT), the standard intermediate for almost all refined tungsten chemistry - established the second major weaponisation precedent after antimony's August-December 2024 controls. In 2026 Beijing replaced the existing quota system with a licensing regime that limits export to 15 authorised companies. APT prices have moved from ~$900/MTU at end-2025 to ~$2,250/MTU by mid-March 2026 (+150%) and over $3,000/MTU by April 2026 (+230% in roughly three months). The pattern - sequential licensing, dual-use designations, ultimately military-end-user restrictions - is structurally identical to the antimony playbook. The strategic significance is that tungsten carbide cutting tools, kinetic-penetrator military rounds, EUV lithography pellicles, CVD precursors for semiconductor backend manufacturing, and a long tail of industrial applications have no near-term substitutes. The single highest-leverage forward catalyst is whether China extends the licensing regime to a full embargo on US military end users in late 2026 or 2027.

The mid-tier demand recovers fastest if Sangdong Phase 2 lands on schedule

Tungsten demand splits into three tiers with different sensitivity to supply. Defence demand (kinetic penetrators, armour-piercing rounds) is price-inelastic and underpins a sustained premium. Top-tier industrial demand (EUV pellicles, semiconductor CVD precursors, high-precision carbide cutting tools) is also price-inelastic and locked into long-cycle qualification. The mid-tier - bulk carbide cutting inserts, oil-and-gas drill bits, wear-resistant alloys - is the demand band that has been most disrupted by price-tripling and that recovers fastest if Sangdong Phase 2 lands on schedule. Watch the mid-tier carbide spot market in 2027-Q1 as the leading indicator of whether the supply response has actually rebalanced the market or whether Chinese licensing still sets the price.

State of the art (2026)

As of mid-2026 tungsten is China's second weaponised critical mineral after antimony. Beijing's February 2025 export controls and the December 2025 designation of just 15 authorised exporters cut APT shipments sharply and pushed APT from ~$920/MTU at the start of 2026 to roughly $3,040/MTU by late May. China still mines about 80% of global tungsten and dominates refining. The Western answer is concentrated in a single asset: Almonty's Sangdong mine in South Korea, which began Phase 1 production in March 2026 (~640,000 tonnes of ore a year) with a 2027 Phase 2 expansion targeting ~4,600 tonnes of contained metal, about 40% of non-China demand. Tungsten West's UK Hemerdon restart and EU CRMA designations follow, but none rival Sangdong before 2028.

Almonty Sangdong is the Western tungsten supply response

Almonty Industries' Sangdong mine in South Korea is the single most important non-Chinese tungsten asset in the 2026-2030 window. Phase 1 operations began on 16 March 2026 processing 640,000 tonnes of ore annually; Phase 2 expansion to 1.2 million tonnes per year is planned for 2027 and would double output to ~4,600 tonnes of tungsten contained metal - enough to meet roughly 40% of global non-Chinese demand at full capacity. Washington has explicitly exempted Almonty's tungsten ores, concentrates and oxides from US retaliatory tariffs, signalling strategic priority. The structural question is whether Sangdong Phase 2 lands on the 2027 schedule and whether US/EU buyers commit to long-term offtake at premiums sufficient to underwrite the project. No second Western project of comparable scale is currently in construction; Tungsten West's UK Hemerdon restart targets Q2 2027 but is structurally smaller.