China's Critical Metal Imports Surge 60% YoY as Tungsten Prices Triple in European Markets This Year
Alina Collins
China imported 350,000 tonnes of 22 critical metals in the first five months of 2025, up 60% year-on-year, while simultaneously restricting their export — a buy-and-lock strategy that has driven European tungsten prices to triple their January level.
How big is the import surge?
January-to-May imports totalled 350,000 metric tonnes, up 60% year-on-year; March alone exceeded 90,000 tonnes, the highest single month in over seven years.
All 22 metals sit on Beijing's February 2025 export-control list, covering tungsten, tellurium, bismuth, molybdenum, indium and others.
This means → China is systematically moving these metals onshore at a scale and speed far beyond normal restocking.
Why import heavily and restrict exports at the same time?
Toru Okabe, a critical-metals specialist at the University of Tokyo, said the import-export combination "aims to reinforce market control and consolidate policy impact."
In plain terms = buy up everything available globally while shutting your own export gate — the less inventory others hold, the heavier China's bargaining chips.
China is also expanding imports of unprocessed ore: molybdenum and tungsten ore imports rose 59% to 55,400 tonnes, sourced mainly from Myanmar, Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan — countries with close diplomatic ties to Beijing.
What is the impact on Europe and Japan?
By late May, European ammonium paratungstate (APT — tungsten's main traded form) hit roughly $3,000 per metric tonne unit, up about two-fold from January — meaning the price tripled.
Japanese firms cut off from Chinese supply are forced to source elsewhere at sharply higher cost.
This reflects a fully connected transmission chain: export controls → supply gap → price spike → downstream buyers forced to pay up.
What is happening to tungsten prices inside China?
Domestic tungsten prices held at historic highs around March, then fell more than half from their recent peak.
This means → the domestic-international price gap has widened further — Chinese manufacturers use cheaper tungsten to make cemented-carbide cutting tools, then export the finished product at low prices, squeezing Japanese and other competitors downstream.
A person at a Japanese cemented-carbide toolmaker warned that cheap Chinese tool exports would entrench China's dominance in the downstream market.
What role does North Korea play in this game?
From January to May, China imported tungsten ore worth $87.5 million from North Korea, roughly a tenfold increase in value year-on-year; volume rose 15% to 1,291 tonnes, with the value surge driven mainly by price.
Tungsten ore is now the highest-value category among North Korea's exports to China.
Mitsuhiro Mimura, a North Korea economy specialist at the University of Niigata Prefecture, noted that after the UN Security Council banned North Korean coal and iron ore exports in 2017, tungsten — not covered by sanctions — rose sharply in foreign-exchange priority.
What is the key variable in this resource contest?
Ryan McAdams, CEO of US tungsten-scrap recycler Amermin, told Nikkei that "unfriendly countries" are buying American tungsten scrap, naming China as the buyer — even the recycling link is being folded into the stockpiling chain.
In plain terms = China is not just buying ore and finished goods; it is snapping up other countries' used scrap, aiming to control every single link in the supply chain.
The replacement cost facing non-Chinese buyers will be the core variable that tests the real-world impact of this resource contest.
Content is for reference only, not financial advice.