Obama is making the Americans work for China!

[gaelic cowboy]

I expect china has 97% of the market because they decided to sell it for less than everyone else and worldwide production shut down. Very doubtful that 97% of the rare earth elements are in china.

Mostly they bought the rights to them materials cos no one cared too much about them what with them being rare and used for renewable industry. But you are correct that they did force others to close by selling cheaper then the bust happened and now the governments and companies need cash so there selling off there rights.

China has the rights to these minerals all over the place and they obviously have first dibs on them and at the minute that means the majority of the supply therefore comes from China