Tungsten carbide cutting tools: up >300% since the start of 2026. The one ex-China supplier easing that squeeze for semiconductor industry just signed itself to the US government. $450M DoW deal. The deal: the US Department of War (DoW) puts $450M into Elmet Group $ELMT Read the final point on screenshot - Defense Logistics Agency (DLA) supply contract worth up to $2B to deliver tungsten ores, concentrates & sodium tungstate to rebuild the NDS (National Defense Stockpile). The supplier: EQ Resources ( the #1# or #2# ex-China tungsten producer. 4,000t of contained WO3 over 8 years into the Springer APT (ammonium paratungstate) JV in Nevada (Elmet 70%, Blue Moon BMM 20%, EQR 10%), on top of its existing Elmet offtake. That's 500 tonnes(in aggregate) of WO3, or 50,000 mtu - about EQR's quarterly production. IMO that's the floor and may be extended depending on pricing arrangement. It can also act as a hedging option in the future. EQR also gets up to 1,000 tonnes of APT processing capacity at the Springer facility for the first 5 years of APT production - I anticipate this will also be sold to US defense industry. They will likely offer a price too good for EQR to reject. Once commissioned, likely late 2028 or early 2029, that supply no longer flows through on open market. It goes straight to US defense. Consider them gone from traditional markets(or non-military). While US is calling it "reshoring Tungsten supply chain", the priority is defense driven, that is also fueled by geopolitical tensions. Or say it different, US needs to replenish the armory that has been depleted in US-Iran war. It's 2 defense actions at once: replenish the armory & rebuild the tungsten reserve. And DoW needs to restock fast. The terms confirm it: redeemable preferred equity, warrants up to 19.9%, board rights, plus that $2B stockpile contract. My guess is defense-first priority is written into the conditions for the $450m funding. As mentioned, the US can outbid anyone for whatever flows through the system. Meanwhile China is expected to keep its tungsten export controls in place. 22 tonnes of APT export to Japan in first half of 2026. Japan has taken the hit across every semi application: WF6, tungsten carbide, sputtering targets. Cutting tools were already a seller's market: restricted upstream supply, exploding downstream demand, price-insensitive buyers. Chinese & Japanese toolmakers (China Tungsten Hightech, Dtech, Topoint, Fuji Die, Sumitomo, Mitsubishi Materials) are all struggling to source stable Tungsten supplies, and have been forced to split deliveries amongst customers. Some customers pre-pay & pre-order to secure supply. Whatever is produced is being sold. Whatever hasn't been produced, has also been sold. The US Tungsten scrap export ban made it worse: since August, US sellers must keep 100% of tungsten waste & scrap sales domestic. That was Japan's alternative to Chinese supplies - export grew several-fold since Chinese export control came into effect. That tap has now been shut off, meaning 2 of the largest tungsten suppliers to Japan have shut the tap off. On a macro level, I can't see who fills that gap by 2028. 50,000 mtu sounds minimal, but it's a pretty huge gap. Tungsten West, Almonty & Pure Tungsten only cover what was already needed. None of them account for this deal. The JV removes one of the largest ex-China suppliers almost entirely and dedicating it to a single country looks like a black swan event to me. If anything, I see that as bad news for Tungsten applications in semi industry. So this is what I expect to happen. All Tungsten downstream customers will be panicking to want to secure whatever supply that can find now, they will even consider pre-pay to sign off takes( this is especially true for Japanese). You can also expect to see price increases across the Tungsten carbide industry. The industry had a "soft-landing" because of the existing inventory they built. It's been 9 months since the export control was implemented. So majority of the inventory has been exhausted. So these companies are now forced to pass on whatever the costs they have received from their upstream to their customers. Importantly, AI/semiconductor markets are extremely price-insensitive to Tungsten prices now. So they will take whatever comes their way. I rarely state my views publicly unless I'm highly certain. This is one of them.