Xinhua –
For some of the rare earths, the share was even higher. Of the 220 tons of Scandium and Yttrium imported during this period, which were worth 1.7 million euros, 94.4 percent came from China.
Whatever universe that is true in – Y and Sc at €7 a kg or so – it’s not this one.
Source: Xinhua Editor: Zhu Ying
Tsk.
Is it a milion/billion thing? Bring back the milliard and avoid this confusion!
Doesn’t really work at 220 kg either, then the price is much too high. 2.2 tonnes? Maybe. Could be, around and about. $1.1 million for a tonne of Sc maybe. But still pretty high for Y. There’s no obvious mistake that leads to that number that is.
Xinhua have just used google translate on the German press release i think
https://www.destatis.de/DE/Presse/Pressemitteilungen/Zahl-der-Woche/2023/PD23_04_p002.html
If your language skills are good, someone could use the contact form to tell the destatis press office of their error.
Numbers from the German government are as fixed and fucked as those from the Chinese government?
Pass me the smelling salts!
Who are the Institute of Rare Earths and Strategic Metals in Lucerne?
Bunch of spivs
https://en.institut-seltene-erden.de/
Actually, that’s a scam in the masking. Crims, not spivs.
There is a distinct lack of hard info on the people involved up on that site.
Still, stop beating about the bush and tell us what you really think.
What am I missing:
220Tonne * 1000kg/Tonne * Eur7/kg = Eur 1,540,000 – so ~1.7 ‘American’ millions, plus or minus a rounding error?
Or did I misinterpret: I took Tim’s comment as as assertion that SC and Y were at Eur7ish per kilo…
D’oh!
Or Germany has been overpaying for rare earth metals of dubious purity.
Retail investment grade rare earths, as Tim might have it.
This would also be no surprise.
In 2019 according to https://pubs.usgs.gov/periodicals/mcs2020/mcs2020-yttrium.pdf
Yttrium oxide was about 3$/kg
The metal was about 10 times that.
Maybe Destatis have been quoting imports of the oxides and not the metals in their press release.
Chris Miller: Bringing back the milliard would just add another term to be misused by journalists. The problem is innumeracy, not lack of terms.
@M
Oh sure, they’d still get it wrong. But at least it isn’t just a typo. (And it’s much more logical that a billion should be a million million, as sewer le continong.)