On February 3, 2026, US President Donald Trump announced the launch of the Treasury Plan, a $12 billion strategic reserve project for critical minerals. Aimed at breaking the US reliance on imports in the critical minerals sector, safeguarding the supply chain security of domestic manufacturers and seizing the dominance of the global critical minerals industrial chain, the project pools $10 billion in loans from the US Export-Import Bank and $2 billion in private capital. Its reserve targets cover gallium, cobalt, rare earths and other critical materials applied in electronics, batteries, aerospace and other fields. Senior US government officials revealed that Trump’s Treasury Plan is similar to the US existing Strategic Petroleum Reserve of U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), and its operation mode also draws on this mature system. Participating enterprises can extract materials on the premise of daily inventory replenishment, and the entire reserve can be fully activated in case of supply disruptions.
To date, more than a dozen leading enterprises including General Motors, Boeing and Google have joined the plan. The US side also disclosed that it will announce the signing of relevant bilateral trade agreements with 11 countries this week. Japan, South Korea, Australia and other countries intend to participate, and nearly 20 other countries have expressed strong interest in joining. The agreements will realize duty-free trade of critical minerals and set price floors for them. To accelerate the layout of the supply chain, the US held the first Ministerial Conference on Critical Minerals on February 4, with representatives from more than 50 countries in attendance. However, the diplomatic row triggered by the Trump administration over the Greenland issue has made European allies cautious about cooperation, and most countries are unwilling to commit to building a supply chain that bypasses specific countries.
The direct reason for the Trump administration to launch this plan is the rare earth crisis the US encountered during relevant trade negotiations in 2025. At present, the US is completely dependent on imports for a number of critical minerals, and the import proportion of dozens of other minerals exceeds 50%. What’s more, the US has long lacked a strategic reserve system for critical minerals in the civil field, making this plan an important attempt to fill this gap. US Secretary of Commerce Luttig even stated explicitly that the plan is designed to help the US recapture the dominance of multiple industries including critical minerals, mining and the automotive industry.
Yet the advancement of the Treasury Plan is faced with multiple practical challenges. First, the fund scale is limited. The CEO of Almonty Industries, a tungsten miner, pointed out that $12 billion will be a drop in the bucket when spread across dozens of critical metals. In addition, the regulation that government procurement shall not disrupt the market will greatly restrict the actual effect of the plan. Meanwhile, the global supply of tungsten and other minerals is in a persistent tight state, forcing the US to engage in fierce international competition for resources with other countries. Second, allies have insufficient willingness to cooperate. The rift between the US and Europe caused by the Greenland issue has not been resolved. European diplomats made it clear that they cannot recognize the US-proposed cooperation framework for critical minerals until the relevant issues are completely settled.
As highlighted in the latest energy news, the more crucial problem is that the US lacks a complete processing and manufacturing system for critical minerals. Although it has basic mineral mining capabilities, its core refining and processing capacity is weak and the relevant industrial chain has not yet taken shape. Relying solely on raw material reserves, it is difficult to achieve real supply chain security guarantees. In addition, US industrial policies have inherent shortcomings. The short political cycle and the highly market-oriented nature of enterprises lead to insufficient policy coherence. Moreover, the strategic management of critical minerals is far more complex than that of oil. Their demand changes dynamically with the development of science and technology, making inventory allocation highly prone to resource misallocation.
In fact, this is not the first time the US has laid out an international alliance for critical minerals. During the previous Biden administration, the US planned to establish a critical minerals production alliance with G7 members and advanced the drafting of relevant trade agreements with the EU, aiming to ensure the supply of raw materials needed for clean energy technologies and other fields. However, these measures ultimately failed to achieve the expected results, and the supply chain shortcomings in the critical minerals sector remain unaddressed. Analysts pointed out that the plan actually draws on relevant international industrial strategies, but its long-term operational viability under the existing US institutional system is highly questionable. Industry professionals stated that the plan is unlikely to achieve tangible results in the short term. Although the US has a foundation in mineral mining, its critical mineral refining capacity is weak and the industrial chain is not yet formed, meaning its actual strategic effect can only be seen after the complete construction of the relevant industrial chain. The US has long criticized the intervention of state power in the market, yet it is now adopting similar measures in the critical minerals sector. While this move may slightly strengthen the weak links in the supply chain in the short term, it may blur the boundary between the market and policies in the long run, arousing doubts from both allies and the market.
