Business & Economics
Trump Unveils $12 B 'Project Vault' Strategic Critical-Minerals Reserve
On 3 Feb 2026, President Trump launched Project Vault, leveraging a $10 billion EXIM Bank loan plus $1.67 billion in private money to build the first U.S. civilian stockpile of rare-earth and other critical minerals.
Focusing Facts
- EXIM Bank approved a record 15-year $10 billion credit line to finance the reserve’s purchases and storage.
- Initial participants—including GM, Boeing, Google and commodity traders Hartree, Traxys and Mercuria—agreed to fixed-price, buy-back contracts for the minerals they will later withdraw.
- An 11-nation supply-chain pact is due to be signed at a Washington ministerial on 5 Feb 2026 where Project Vault will be the centrepiece.
Context
Project Vault reprises the logic of the 1975 U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve and echoes Beijing’s own metal stockpiles formalised in the 2010s: when China choked rare-earth exports to Japan in 2010 and again to the U.S. in 2025, it exposed the leverage embedded in resource concentration. The new U.S. reserve signals a broader turn toward state-backed industrial policy and resource nationalism that has been growing since the 2008 financial crisis and the COVID-era supply shocks. Whether it reshapes power or merely blunts emergencies will hinge on processing capacity, not inventory—a lesson from Britain’s tin buffer stock collapse in 1985. Viewed on a 100-year horizon, the move underscores the shift from oil to minerals as the strategic commodity of the digital-electric age, accelerating the slow decoupling of Sino-American supply chains and the re-emergence of stockpiling as a central tool of great-power competition.
Perspectives
Western mainstream & business press
Bloomberg Law, CBS News, The Guardian, Asharq Al-Awsat — Present Project Vault as a proactive $12 billion safeguard that will help U.S. and allied manufacturers avoid supply shocks and curb Beijing’s leverage over critical minerals. Relies heavily on White House talking points and industry voices, glossing over possible environmental costs and whether stockpiling actually reduces long-term dependence, a framing that flatters the Trump administration’s strategy.
Chinese state-owned media
Global Times — Argues the U.S. scheme is little more than short-term stockpiling and cannot dent China’s entrenched technological and processing edge in rare earths anytime soon. Downplays threats to China’s market dominance and highlights U.S. weaknesses to reassure domestic readers and trading partners, reflecting Beijing’s interest in protecting its mineral supremacy.
U.S. market-oriented conservative press
The Wall Street Journal — Says Washington is copying Beijing’s state-directed capitalism by financing a government-led stockpile, signaling an uncomfortable shift away from free-market principles. Stresses the ideological inconsistency and potential inefficiency of state intervention, reflecting the outlet’s free-market editorial stance and skepticism toward large government spending even when framed as national security.