- China introduces new export controls on rare earth elements
- These elements are used in the manufacture of many PC components
- This could put additional pricing pressures on manufacturers of these components, on top of already existing market forces that are driving up the cost of drives and RAM.
If you don’t want to hear more negative comments about new price pressures on PCs and related components like SSDs, then prepare yourself: a new danger is on the horizon.
Tom’s Hardware reports that China is introducing new export controls on rare earth elements used in the manufacturing of many important PC components.
The move takes effect from December 2025 and is effectively an extension of rules introduced in April, extending China’s export controls to elements such as holmium, thulium, erbium, ytterbium, europium, terbium and more.
China says the distribution of these rare earth elements is strictly monitored for national security reasons and that the export of these materials will be refused for use in semiconductors or the defense industry.
Additionally, the technical know-how associated with transforming elements into magnets also falls under the new rules.
Magnets are essential for storage products, as are rare earth elements related to the construction of motors for hard drives, as well as for cooling fans. Monitors will also be affected, with LCD panels and backlights using phosphor compounds containing these rare earth minerals.
Tom’s Hardware notes that even silicon chips may feel some pressure in terms of restrictions on cerium oxide slurries, which are used to polish the large wafers made into processors.
Analysis: the only way is up, in terms of prices
So there could be widespread effects, especially since China is by far the largest supplier of these rare earth elements.
If it becomes more difficult to source these materials and prices rise for manufacturers – or if delays in obtaining these materials affect production lines – the end result for consumers will not be good. As always, whenever prices increase during the manufacturing process, those costs are passed on to the buyer of the product, helping maintain profit margins.
There are some thorny issues here, the first being that there aren’t a whole range of alternatives other than China for obtaining these items (especially some of them). Although some companies have already explored different avenues, and as Tom’s Hardware notes, Western Digital, which makes a wide range of storage products, launched a project to extract and recycle rare earth minerals from old drives earlier this year.
The second major problem for potential PC buyers is that this follows a whole slew of recent bad news regarding the rising cost of SSDs and hard drives, as well as system RAM. With the price of various components constantly rising, the overall bill for buying (or building) a new PC could start to get considerably more expensive as 2026 kicks in and rolls on.
This year’s Black Friday sales could be even busier than usual on the PC front, as people try to score a good deal ahead of these various pricing pressures.
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