Trump Mineral Price Supports Can Counter Chinese Manipulation of Critical Minerals Markets

NioCorp CEO Tells CNBC that the White House is Showing "Unbelievable Courage" in its Aggressive Critical Minerals Policies to Support U.S. Production

CENTENNIAL, CO / ACCESS Newswire / October 7, 2025 / NioCorp Developments Ltd. ("NioCorp" or the "Company") (Nasdaq:NB), a leading U.S. critical minerals development company, today praised the Trump Administration for its "unbelievable courage" in proposing price supports for U.S.-produced critical minerals as a means of encouraging domestic production and countering decades of Chinese market manipulation of critical minerals.

NioCorp Executive Chairman and CEO Mark A. Smith made the comments in an appearance on CNBC Asia's The China Connection to discuss the strengthening of U.S. critical minerals supply chains and the Trump administration's decisive actions to address longstanding market imbalances.

"The Trump administration has demonstrated unbelievable courage in this industry," Mr. Smith said. "They are providing price-floor supports that take care of that price-manipulation issue and help unlock financing for domestic projects. That challenge will be behind us very quickly as the administration continues to work on each and every one of the critical and strategic minerals in the world today. I think that's really good news for the world overall."

"The current White House, President Trump and his staff really understand the age-old issue coming out of China right now, where they gain total control of a market and can either increase or decrease prices, and all of us outside of China have troubles financing our projects as a result," Mr. Smith said.

"China has put billions and billions of dollars into their critical and strategic minerals program for decades now," he said. "And you don't just flip a switch and have a new mine and processing facility. In the United States, we tend to have one of the longest permitting timeframes available. I'm very pleased and happy to report that the NioCorp Project in Nebraska…is fully permitted and ready for construction. Once project financing is in place, we'll start construction, and it's three years to finish that project and have product flowing into the United States. And we won't just have rare earths at our facility. We'll have heavy rare earths and some light rare earths…[which] are particularly important because that's an issue that still faces the Pentagon today, and we can help provide that domestic source. We'll also be producing niobium, scandium, and titanium, three elements that are also critical and strategic to the United States."