China controls 79% of world tungsten supply; U.S. seeks domestic sources

China Mines 79% of World Tungsten. The U.S. Answer Needs Land

PR Newswire

VANCOUVER, BC , Sept. 16, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- American News Group News Commentary - The U.S. Geological Survey put Chinese mine output at 67,000 of the world's 85,000 tonnes of tungsten in 2025, close to 79% of global supply, with the United States mining none, as it has every year since 2015. Washington has responded with money and with rules. From January 1, 2027, the restriction under DFARS 252.225-7052 on tungsten from China, Russia, Iran and North Korea widens from the melt or production stage to the mine or ore stage, and recycled material will no longer reset country of origin. What neither the money nor the rules can manufacture is land. Before a single ounce of domestic tungsten reaches a defense supplier, somebody has to hold the claims, and somebody has to hold the right to put a mine on the surface above them. That second part is where American projects most often stall. Active Companies from around the markets with current developments this week include: Western Star Resources Inc. (CSE: WSR) (OTC: WSRIF) (FRA: 4K2), Perpetua Resources Corp. (Nasdaq: PPTA), United States Antimony Corporation (NYSE: UAMY), Nova Minerals Corp. (NYSE American: NVA), and Trilogy Metals Inc. (NYSE American: TMQ).

Mineral rights and surface rights are separate estates in much of the American West, and they are frequently held by different owners. A company can locate valid federal lode claims and still have no right to drive a road, build a pad, site a mill, place tailings or bring in power, because the surface above belongs to a private landowner. On split estate ground the federal mineral estate is administered by the Bureau of Land Management while the surface is privately owned, and the two have to be reconciled before anything is built.

That reconciliation is normally done late and expensively. A junior proves up a deposit, then discovers that the ranch above it is a negotiation rather than a formality, and the schedule slips while lawyers work. Projects that look technically sound stall at the permitting boundary for reasons that have nothing to do with geology. The documentation required for BLM and state permitting of a new mining operation starts with surface-owner consent and right of entry, and without those a permit application does not begin.

The price backdrop makes the timing matter more than it used to. Tungsten concentrate, basis 50 to 70% WO3, cif global, was assessed by Fastmarkets at $750 to $850 per metric tonne unit at the start of 2026 and has held at $2,500 to $2,800 per mtu since May 29. China said in December 2025 that only 15 firms would be authorized to export tungsten in 2026 and 2027. Buyers outside that list are competing for a restricted pool while a procurement deadline closes in, and the projects that can move are the ones that already have their paperwork.

Western Star Resources Acquires Fourteen Lode Claims and a 25-Year Surface Use Agreement at Eagle Point, New Mexico

Fourteen newly acquired lode claims cover the western extension of the mineralized skarn system along the prospective limestone-intrusive contact, contiguous with the western boundary of the Eagle Point Tungsten Project in Hidalgo County, New Mexico.

Exclusive surface-use rights for mineral operations over the acreage described in the Company's release, with an initial five-year term and four five-year renewal options for up to 25 years, covering exploration through potential mining, processing and reclamation.

Historical trenches and excavations documented in 1950s U.S. Government examination reports under the Defense Minerals Exploration Administration programme now sit within the expanded land position and have never been followed up with modern geophysics, systematic sampling or drilling.

Cross-development rights allow the Eagle Point surface to host infrastructure, processing and tailings for ore from adjacent ground controlled by the Company.

The ongoing UAV magnetic survey has been expanded to cover the enlarged property, delivering one seamless dataset over the full interpreted extent of the system.

Western Star Resources Inc. (CSE: WSR) (OTC: WSRIF) (FRA: 4K2) announced the acquisition of fourteen lode mining claims contiguous with the western boundary of its Eagle Point Tungsten Project in Hidalgo County, New Mexico, together with the benefit of a Surface Use Agreement providing exclusive surface-use rights for mineral operations for an initial five-year term with renewal options for up to 25 years. The claims were located by the vendors under the Bureau of Land Management Notice of Intent to Locate process, which applies to split estate lands where the federal mineral estate is administered by the BLM and the surface estate is privately owned.

Under the Agreement, entered into with the surface owner, the Company holds the sole and exclusive right to use the surface over the new claims and the surrounding ranch lands, covering the full life of mine from exploration and development through open-pit and underground mining, processing, tailings and waste management, and reclamation. The surface owner has agreed not to permit competing exploration, drilling or mining on the ranch lands. The Agreement permits up to 200 acres of active disturbance at any one time, with Western Star controlling the timing, methods and pace of operations, and it is freely assignable.

The breadth is the point. Management believes rights of this kind are unusual for a company at the exploration stage, and the reasoning is not difficult to follow. Exclusive surface use, infrastructure rights, tailings and processing entitlements and renewable tenure of up to 25 years are normally assembled piecemeal at the development stage, often at material cost and delay, and their absence is a common reason projects stall at the permitting boundary. At Eagle Point they are in place before the drill program.

"Securing the western extension with the surface rights already in hand is exactly how we want to grow Eagle Point; decisively, and with long-term surface access locked in. The New Claims contain part of the historical trench network that helped define this system, and they have never been touched by modern exploration. With the drone survey expanded while it is still in the air, the entire system will be imaged as one seamless dataset"

commented Blake Morgan, President and Chief Executive Officer of Western Star Resources.

The new ground covers the interpreted western continuation of the Eagle Point skarn system, where the prospective limestone-intrusive contact projects under shallow cover beyond the original claim boundary. A portion of the historical trenches and excavations that helped define the historical mineralized zones sits within the newly acquired claims. The 1955 geological sketch map filed as map sheet DMEA 3276 in DMEA Docket 3701 shows those trenches and workings within the new claims, and the Company has expanded its ongoing UAV magnetic survey to include them.

Historical trench sampling from a 1955 U.S. Geological Survey report in the same docket returned values including 0.75% WO3 over six feet in sheared granite contact at a pit near Trench No. 4, 0.40% WO3 over five feet at Trench No. 7 and 0.35% WO3 over five feet at Trench No. 9. Those results are historical, pre-date NI 43-101, are not documented as to sample type, method or quality control, have not been independently verified by the Company, and should not be relied upon. They are presented solely as context for the historical exploration of the property.

Consideration for the claims and the benefit of the Agreement is a cash payment of C$150,000 and the issuance of 4,000,000 common shares on closing, plus a 1.5% net smelter returns royalty granted to the vendors, of which the Company may repurchase 1.0% for a one-time payment of C$1,000,000. Closing remains subject to customary conditions including receipt of all necessary regulatory approvals. With surface access secured, Western Star is advancing detailed mapping and sampling across the property and initiating baseline environmental and permitting work, alongside its Rowland and White Star tungsten projects in Nevada.

Read this and more news on this sector here: http://AmericanNewsGroup.com

There's plenty more of exciting developments and happenings in the market this week:

Perpetua Resources Corp. (Nasdaq: PPTA) is the clearest illustration in the sector of what clearing the land and permitting boundary is worth. Its Stibnite gold-antimony project in Idaho is permitted and in construction, backed by a US$2.9 billion senior secured loan approved by the Export-Import Bank of the United States in 2026 under the Make More in America Initiative, with processing equipment fabrication now underway at a custom facility in Europe.

The relevant detail for a company at Western Star's stage is how long that took. Stibnite spent years in federal permitting before construction capital arrived, and the financing followed the permits rather than preceding them. Perpetua is a materially larger and more advanced company in a different commodity, and it is named here to mark the distance between a study and a financed build rather than as any kind of comparable.

United States Antimony Corporation (NYSE: UAMY) describes itself as the only fully integrated antimony company in the world outside China and Russia, and now markets itself under the banner of antimony, gold, tungsten and zeolite, which puts tungsten formally inside its stated portfolio. In an August 25, 2026 update the Company reported the continuation of mining at its Stibnite Hill property in Thompson Falls, Montana, having transported 42 truckloads of stibnite ore from the mine to date in 2026, averaging approximately 14 tons per truck at approximately 10% antimony content.

US Antimony is useful context because it owns the processing end that a domestic tungsten or antimony miner ultimately has to reach. It has been acquiring claims, patented properties and leases across Alaska, Montana and Ontario prospective for antimony and other critical minerals, with the stated aim of increasing throughput at its own facilities and reducing reliance on third-party ore purchases. It uplisted to the New York Stock Exchange in March 2026.

Nova Minerals Corp. (NYSE American: NVA) received approximately 500 tons of equipment at Port MacKenzie, Alaska in September 2026 for its planned antimony processing and refining facility, comprising more than 40 containers and oversized loads of crushing, ore sorting, milling, flotation and refining equipment. The barge departed Seattle on August 26 and arrived in Cook Inlet on September 6, which the Company described as ahead of schedule following six months of procurement and logistics coordination.

The facility is funded by a US$43.4 million award from the U.S. Department of War under Title III of the Defense Production Act, and is designed to process stibnite-bearing material and initially produce antimony trisulfide, with a modular design allowing potential expansion into antimony metal and antimony trioxide. Nova's flagship Estelle gold and critical minerals project covers 514 square kilometres in Alaska. It is a different commodity and a different jurisdiction, included as an example of federal money moving into domestic processing capacity rather than only into the ground.

Trilogy Metals Inc. (NYSE American: TMQ) is on this list for the access question specifically. Its Upper Kobuk Mineral Projects in northwest Alaska have for years turned on the proposed Ambler Access road, a surface and right-of-way matter rather than a geological one, and the project's progress has tracked that question more closely than it has tracked drill results.

Trilogy is also among the small group of critical-minerals companies in which the United States government has taken a direct equity stake, alongside Lithium Americas and MP Materials, in what has been read as a willingness to support strategically important domestic projects directly. Readers should note that Trilogy's shares have been volatile and that the Ambler access question remains unresolved. It is referenced as sector and policy context, not as a comparable of Western Star.

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Article Sources:

[1] Western Star Resources Inc., news release dated September 15, 2026 (claims acquisition, Surface Use Agreement terms, historical trench data, consideration and royalty terms, Blake Morgan commentary, Qualified Person).

[2] U.S. Geological Survey, Mineral Commodity Summaries, February 2026 (global and U.S. tungsten production).

[3] Fastmarkets price assessment, tungsten concentrate basis 50 to 70% WO3, cif global; Defense Federal Acquisition Regulation Supplement clause 252.225-7052.

[4] U.S. Geological Survey report by J.N. Faick, Docket DMEA-3701, U.S. Department of the Interior, Defense Minerals Exploration Administration (1955).

[5] Public disclosures and filings of the referenced companies (Perpetua Resources, United States Antimony, Nova Minerals, Trilogy Metals).

Contact Information: American News Group info@americannewsgroup.com

Media Contact: American News Group info@americannewsgroup.com

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The historical trench sample results referenced in this article are historical in nature, are taken from a 1955 U.S. Geological Survey report and accompanying maps contained in DMEA Docket 3701, and were generated prior to the implementation of National Instrument 43-101. The sample type, sampling and analytical methods, and quality assurance and quality control procedures used are not documented; the Company has not independently verified the results; a Qualified Person has not done sufficient work to verify them; and they should not be relied upon. They are presented solely to provide context regarding the historical exploration of the property and are not necessarily indicative of the mineralization that may be present. Historical trenches, excavations and workings are not evidence of a mineral resource. Magnetic and structural features identified by the Company's UAV magnetic survey are conceptual exploration targets only, and a magnetic anomaly is not evidence of mineralization. The closing of the acquisition of the new claims remains subject to the satisfaction of customary conditions, including the receipt of all necessary regulatory approvals, and there is no assurance that it will close on the terms described or at all. Rights under the Surface Use Agreement, including renewal options extending tenure to up to 25 years, are contractual rights whose exercise depends on the Company's election and on continued compliance with the agreement; they are not permits, and they do not assure that any permit, authorization or approval under federal or New Mexico law will be granted. Statements regarding future mapping, sampling, geophysics, baseline environmental and permitting work, drill targeting, drilling and the potential development of Eagle Point as a U.S. source of tungsten are forward-looking and may not occur as described. The scientific and technical information in the Company's release has been reviewed and approved by Jasper Mowatt, MIMMM, MAusIMM, a Qualified Person as defined by National Instrument 43-101. Mr. Mowatt is a consultant to the Company and is therefore NOT independent of Western Star Resources Inc. Please refer to the Company's filings on SEDAR+ at www.sedarplus.ca for the assumptions and risk factors associated with its disclosure. The Canadian Securities Exchange has neither approved nor disapproved the contents of the Company's release. Cautionary Note Regarding Market and Policy Data: Tungsten price levels cited in this article are third-party price assessments as reported by Fastmarkets describing a specified concentrate grade and delivery basis; they are not the realized price of any company and are not a forecast. Production figures are drawn from the U.S. Geological Survey. 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SOURCE American News Group

PR Newswire

September 16, 2026 - 6:15 AM PDT

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