On November 10, China’s Ministry of Commerce reaches the automatic reinstatement date embedded in MOFCOM Announcement No. 70 of 2025 — the instrument that suspended Announcements 55, 56, 57, 58, 61 and 62 for precisely one year. What reasserts itself is a comprehensive architecture covering rare earth mining equipment, smelting and separation technology, medium and heavy rare earth elements, the extraterritorial 0.1 percent de minimis rule, and a technology catch-all clause.
The framing matters: the November 2025 suspension was never a rollback. The April 2025 controls on seven heavy rare earth elements including dysprosium and terbium, imposed via MOFCOM Announcement No. 18, were never suspended and remain fully operational today. What expires on November 10 is the relief valve — five additional elements (europium, holmium, erbium, thulium, ytterbium) would return to licensing, and the extraterritorial provisions could require export licences for foreign-made products containing Chinese-origin rare earth content.
The data already shows rationing by licence: China shipped 4,735 metric tons of rare earths in August, up 12.1 percent from July but still 18.2 percent below August 2025 and below the year-to-date monthly average of 4,829 tons. The IEA’s Global Critical Minerals Outlook 2026 puts downstream production at risk from full enforcement at $6.5 trillion annually across automotive, defence, high-tech and energy outside China. Markets are pricing a partial thaw — MP Materials fell about 5 percent on summit optimism — but no extension has been signed.