The basic idea: When America runs into a genuine national security chokepoint, policy stops pretending to be hands-off and starts actively steering private money toward whatever removes that bottleneck.

The new Section 232 proclamation on critical minerals is a textbook case.

It doesn’t give you the usual “we need to mine more stuff in America” speech. Instead, it says the real problem is processing capacity and derivative products—think rare-earth magnets that go into missiles, jets, and EVs—and frames that gap as a direct threat to national security.

Then comes the interesting part: it tells Commerce and the U.S. Trade Representative to go negotiate deals with allies and explicitly tells them to consider price floors and minimum import prices. You’ve got 180 days before other remedies kick in.

That’s not rhetoric. That’s the government saying “we’re going to manipulate market structure so that building new capacity actually pencils out financially.”

How this actually channels capital:How this actually channels capital:

• Name the specific bottleneck (processing plants, magnet factories) instead of vague slogans about reshoring
• Kill the volatility that murders industrial investment. Use price floors or managed pricing so your $2 billion processing plant doesn’t go bankrupt when China dumps product in the next downcycle
• Use allied agreements + government procurement to create guaranteed demand curves that banks will actually lend against

This has nothing to do with Bitcoin or “sovereign liquidity” arguments. Different conversation entirely. I’m just pointing out that this is constraint-driven industrial policy happening in broad daylight.

Falsification TestFalsification Test

If we get to mid-July 2026 and there are no enforceable agreements, no real procurement commitments or offtake deals, no financing mechanisms, and no actual pricing structure in place, and the supply chain looks exactly the same, then yeah, “policy steers capital” is oversold.

Real question: What’s the actual money-making play here: investing in processing capacity, magnet manufacturing, or the financing/procurement infrastructure that makes both of those bankable in the first place?

SourcesSources

• https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2026/01/adjusting-imports-of-processed-critical-minerals-and-their-derivative-products-into-the-united-states/ — Primary source: the proclamation itself (Section 232 framing, processing/magnets chokepoint, “price floors/minimum import prices,” 180-day update requirement). 
• https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/IF13006 — How Section 232 works: presidential authority + negotiation pathway + what happens if talks fail (clean legal/clock context). 
• https://pubs.usgs.gov/publication/mcs2025 — Import reliance baseline: USGS Mineral Commodity Summaries 2025 landing page (official stats + reference for the “100% net import reliant for 12” type claims). 
• https://www.energy.gov/sites/default/files/2024-12/Neodymium%2520Magnets%2520Supply%2520Chain%2520Report%2520-%2520Final%5B1%5D.pdf — Magnets chokepoint detail: DOE deep dive on rare-earth permanent magnets (concentration + failure modes that make “administered pricing / de-risking capex” relevant).