During the past decade, many impetus investors have turned their attention to a niche angle of the commodity investment markets – technology metals. Companies that explore and or process technology metals are of specific interest to alternative investors because of strong positive moves in the prices. On the basis of the particular growth rate of these metal prices, prudent investors will likely add these alternative assets to their watch lists because they could be setting up for a continued progress.
China extracts over 97% of all tech metals. These minerals are at the core of defense, industrial, and consumer goods technologies. They are used in everything from mobile commucations and sensing devices to wind turbines. China has increased its export controls to meet its domestic demand. This will directly impede production by technology manufacturers.
Technology metals include lanthanides, tantalum, niobium, yttrium, and scandium. Among the lanthanides, neodymium and samarium are used to make magnets for motors and turbines. Lanthanum is used in semiconductor chips for memory and processing devices. Tantalum is used to make steel even stronger and lighter in weight. Defense and cyber-specific applications include jet fighter airframe and engines, guidance systems, space-based communications, and anti-missile defense.
Energy products like transformers for electric transmission, turbines for wind power, and motors for electric transport systems require technology metals for their production. And what makes technology metals more precious is the difficulty in discovering deposits, extracting usable ore, and processing into oxide concentrates.
Over the last 15 years the U.S. has become completely dependent on imports of technology metals, mainly from China. But China has begun to limit its tech-metal production and exports. According to the statistics, world demand for technology metals is projected to rise to at least 160,000 tons annually and will grow by more than 7%. According to the industry experts, the prices of technology metals will continue to grow as supply fails to meet demand.
Electio Invest Dubai offers a guaranteed platform for investors who wish to include tech metals in their portfolios, as they help the investors to physically own these precious metals. Technology metals have held up well during the financial crisis, as they aren’t exchange traded commodities and aren’t subject to exploratory trading like gold, silver and other metals. Prices for materials used in tech metal magnets had actually increased last year; those technology metals include neodymium, praseodymium, terbium, dysprosium and didymium, a blend of praseodymium and neodymium. Electio assists investors to own these metals to make their portfolios safer in a highly volatile financial market.
