Sydney, October 1 (Argus) - Australian rare earth miner and refiner Lynas will acquire Australian mining company Meteoric Resources, thereby gaining control of the Caldeira rare earth mine project in Brazil with an annual production capacity of 4,000 tons. Lynas announced this news today.
This acquisition is valued at approximately 968 million Australian dollars (675 million US dollars) for Meteoric. Lynas expects that the transaction will increase its reported mineral resources by approximately 802,000 tons of praseodymium-nickel oxide and 41,000 tons of dysprosium-tetbium oxide. Lynas estimates that over the entire mining life of the Caldeira mine, the project will achieve a钕-praseodymium production of approximately 3,862 tons per year and a dysprosium-tetbium production of 127 tons per year.
Lynas plans to complete the transaction by March 2027, but the transaction still needs to meet relevant conditions including shareholder approval.
Lynas stated that Caldeira contains both light and heavy rare earth elements and is the largest known ion-adsorption type clay rare earth oxide (REO) mineral resource outside of China, in accordance with the JORC standards.
Lynas' existing asset portfolio includes the Mount Weld praseodymium-nickel mine in Western Australia, the rare earth processing facility in Kalgoorlie, Western Australia, and the refinery in Kuantan, Malaysia.
For the fiscal year ending June 30, 2026, Lynas produced a total of 7,260 tons of saleable praseodymium-nickel products.
