Five Minerals Face Extreme Supply Risk From Single-Country Dominance

By shrijeetverma13 · July 29, 2026

This analysis reveals which minerals are most vulnerable to supply disruptions, with gallium, terbium, and dysprosium leading the risk list due to extreme…

The analysis identified the countries with dominant production shares for the minerals with the highest market concentration (HHI). A bar chart was generated showing, for each of the most critical high-HHI minerals, which country leads in production share and by how much. This visualization highlights the specific minerals and their controlling nations, along with the underlying production share and concentration data in accompanying tables.

The analysis identifies which minerals have the fewest years of reserves remaining based on the latest available data (2026), highlighting those most at risk of imminent depletion. A horizontal bar chart visualizes the top 10 minerals with the lowest years of reserves, color-coded so the most critical cases stand out.

The analysis explored which minerals show the strongest demand growth from 2015 to 2026, generating detailed data tables to compare average growth rates and trend directions across minerals.

Gallium, Terbium, Dysprosium, Niobium, and Tungsten have the highest average supply risk scores and deserve strategic attention. Gallium tops the list with a risk score of 77.59, driven by extreme market concentration (HHI of 0.903) and 94.85% of production coming from a single country, flagged as high-risk 100% of the time. Terbium (68.1) and Dysprosium (67.92), both rare earth elements, follow closely, also with near-total high-risk flagging. Niobium and Tungsten round out the top five, each showing high concentration levels above 80% top-country share. These minerals share a common pattern: heavy reliance on one dominant producing country, making them vulnerable to supply disruptions.

Minerals flagged for disruption next year show clearly elevated supply risk and market concentration beforehand. On average, flagged minerals have a supply risk score of 42.8 versus 37.4 for non-flagged ones, higher market concentration (HHI of 0.479 vs 0.429), and a higher top-country production share (64.8% vs 58.0%). They also show stronger demand growth (15.5% vs 10.8%) and a higher rate of being classified as high supply risk (35.2% vs 29.8%). Interestingly, export controls were not active for any flagged minerals in this dataset, suggesting other risk factors like concentration and demand growth are stronger early warning signs than existing trade restrictions.

Minerals under active export controls show dramatically higher prices and supply risk compared to those without controls. Controlled minerals have a median price of $63,000/tonne—double the $31,500/tonne for uncontrolled minerals—and an average supply risk score of 74.2 versus just 37.1 for uncontrolled minerals. Although only 25 records fall under active export controls compared to 1,523 without, the pattern is clear: export-controlled minerals tend to be significantly scarcer, pricier, and riskier to source.

The analysis ranked countries by their average production share and top-country share percentages, separating rare-earth from non-rare-earth minerals. Two bar charts were generated showing the top 10 supplier nations for each mineral category, along with four supporting data tables that break down the detailed rankings and shares for both rare-earth and non-rare-earth producing countries.

A data table was generated summarizing price outlier detection across minerals, providing a foundation for identifying anomalous price spikes or crashes by mineral, year, and country.

A correlation heatmap was generated comparing supply risk score, hhi, top country share pct, years of reserves, demand growth pct, and price usd per tonne, visually showing how these six supply risk drivers relate to one another. The color-coded matrix (blue for negative, red for positive correlations) lets you quickly spot which factors move together and which move in opposite directions.

The analysis broke down average mine production, reserves, and price by end-use category, producing two grouped bar charts plus supporting data tables. The first chart compares normalized production, reserves, and price levels across end-use segments, while the second highlights supply concentration (HHI) and years-of-reserves scarcity by category, making it easy to spot which end-use segments depend on the most concentrated or limited mineral supplies.