England Recycling Rates Decline for the First Time

Recycling rates in England have dropped from 44.8 percent to 43.9 percent, marking the country's first-ever decline. With this decrease, the UK will likely miss its EU target of recycling at least 50 percent of household waste by 2020.

To help the country get its numbers back on track, waste company Suez is calling for a tax on packaging manufacturers.

The Guardian has the details:

Recycling rates in England have fallen for the first time ever, prompting calls for a tax on packaging and meaning EU targets are now almost certain to be missed.

The amount of rubbish sent to recycling plants by householders had been steadily increasing for more than a decade, but more recently flatlined for three years. Now new government figures published on Thursday show that the recycling rate in England has dropped from 44.8% in 2014 to 43.9% in 2015.

Gold-Futures Selling Exhausting

Speculators' extreme gold-futures selling has been the dominant driver of gold's steep post-election plunge. Their near-record rush for exits blasted gold lower so fast that investors were spooked into fleeing.

But speculators' epic futures long liquidation that crushed gold sure looks to be exhausting itself. So many gold-futures longs have been dumped that there simply aren't many left to sell.

Once speculators' aggressive gold-futures selling ceases, gold prices will stabilize which will arrest the parallel investor selling. That decisive bottoming will pave the way for gold's bull market to resume.

Gold has suffered brutal, withering selling pressure in the month following the U.S. presidential election. The stock markets' surprise surge after Trump's surprise win has led speculators and investors alike to rush for the gold exits. As usual the former group's extreme selling came largely through gold futures. But this gold-futures dumping has been so severe that it is rapidly exhausting itself, a bullish omen for gold.

Gold's stunning post-election selloff resulted from a united mass exodus by gold's two dominant groups of traders. Speculators ferociously dumped gold futures with an intensity rarely witnessed, while stock investors jettisoned shares in the leading SPDR Gold Trust ETF (NYSEARCA:GLD) far faster than gold itself was falling. With so much gold being spewed into the markets so rapidly, this metal didn't have a chance of staying on its feet.

Gold futures had actually skyrocketed on election night, up 4.8% to $1337 as Trump's perceived odds of winning started to soar. But once the plummeting stock markets rebounded violently, the gold selling began. And it soon intensified after the election. Not only did stock markets shockingly surge to new all-time record highs, but the U.S. Dollar Index blasted up to a major new 13.7-year secular high of its own.

Gold has always been a contrarian anti-stock trade. As a rare asset that moves counter to stocks, gold's critical investment demand is heavily dependent on stock-market fortunes. Investors alternatively flock to gold to diversify their stock-heavy portfolios when stock markets fall, and then abandon it as stocks soar again. The exceedingly-strong post-election stock markets swiftly slayed gold investment demand.

Record stock-market highs breed extreme euphoria and complacency. Traders naturally start to believe stocks do nothing but rally indefinitely. Thus their interest in deploying capital in counter-moving gold fades to oblivion. And since investment demand fueled the great lion's share of gold's new bull market this year, this metal couldn't stand without it. Gold's recent cratering resulted from euphoric stock sentiment.

While speculators' extreme gold-futures selling and investors' extreme GLD-share selling over the past month share the blame, that's too much to cover in a single essay. So this week I'm focusing on the gold-futures side. While the massive post-election gold-futures dump was miserably painful, it looks to be exhausting itself which is very bullish. The finite supply of gold futures to sell is rapidly dwindling.

Gold futures have a wildly-outsized impact on gold prices, dominating short-term action. Futures offer radical leverage far beyond the decades-old legal limit in the stock markets of 2.0x. Every gold-futures contract controls 100 troy ounces of gold. At $1175, that's worth $117,500. But the maintenance margin required to own each contract is just $6000 this week, enabling maximum leverage running way up at 19.6x!

And that's actually fairly modest for gold-futures trading, with 25x+ being common when gold hasn't just plunged. Even at 20x, each dollar of capital speculators trade in the futures market commands 20x the impact of a dollar invested in gold outright! So when speculators as a herd aggressively buy or sell gold futures, the gold price moves fast. Their collective amplified power to move gold is immense and unparalleled.

Exacerbating their utter dominance over this metal's short-term fortunes is the fact that gold's reference price traders watch is that very futures one. So when futures speculators bully gold around with their extreme leverage, investors are quick to react which intensifies gold's moves. Contrarian investors have long decried this blatantly-unfair-if-not-absurd gold-market structure granting futures speculators such supremacy.

Further complicating this whole messy situation, gold-futures speculators' trading activities are obscured by low-resolution data. Not only are their trades only reported once a week, but even that happens with a 3-trading-day delay! This effectively hides what gold-futures speculators are doing from wider scrutiny by investors and analysts. This lack of futures transparency has long been a serious problem for gold.

Because of gold futures' extreme inherent leverage, speculators must maintain an ultra-short-term focus to survive. At 20x, a mere 5% adverse gold move will wipe out 100% of their capital risked! So countless times when gold-futures trading on mere herd sentiment drives big gold moves, the day it happens the resulting volatile price action is wrongly and falsely attributed to fundamental changes in the world gold market.

Speculators' collective gold-futures positions are published late every Friday afternoon in the famous Commitments of Traders reports from the CFTC. Those are already old though, current to the week that ended the preceding Tuesday. Thus speculators' market-moving gold-futures trading activity is hidden for up to 8 trading days, which is inexcusable in this information age. Maybe Trump's people can fix this.

So by the time extreme gold-futures selling is unmasked, the resulting big gold plunge has already long been wrongly attributed to fundamentals which greatly damages sentiment for investors. This seriously retards gold investment demand, creating a vicious circle where selling begets selling. And that's what has happened to gold in the wake of the election. Gold selling is feeding on itself, driving even more selling.

This first chart looks at gold and its weekly gold-futures CoT data over the past couple years or so. The total upside bets on gold by both large and small speculators, gold-futures long contracts, are rendered in green. Their total downside bets, short contracts, are shown in red. Gold just suffered its third major plunge this year for the same reason the first two happened, extreme selling by gold-futures speculators.

This longer-term perspective is essential for understanding what's happened to gold in the past month since the election. Note above how gold prices are heavily positively correlated with speculators' long contracts in gold futures. When they collectively ramp up their upside bets, gold surges higher. Then later when they sell these ultra-leveraged longs, gold plunges. Nothing is more important for short-term price action!

While speculators' downside bets on gold through futures shorts are smaller, they have the same gold impact but in the opposite direction. Gold prices are heavily negatively correlated with speculators' gold-futures shorts. When they effectively borrow gold they don't own to short sell it in the futures market, gold is pushed lower. Later when they buy offsetting long gold-futures contracts to cover their shorts, gold climbs.

In the gold-futures market, the downside price impact of selling long contracts and adding short ones is identical. Between January 2015 and December 2015, gold fell 19.3% largely because these futures speculators sold 90.9k long contracts while adding 107.0k short ones. That works out to the equivalent of 615.5 metric tons of gold, nearly 1/5th of 2015's total global mine production! That can't be absorbed fast.

Last year's intense gold-futures selling by speculators, much of which happened on Fed-rate-hike fears, ultimately pushed gold to a deep 6.1-year secular low a year ago in mid-December. Gold bottomed the very next day after the Fed's first rate hike in 9.5 years, entering a new bull market that flourished in much of 2016. By early July, gold had powered 29.9% higher to hit its best levels seen in 2.3 years.

What helped fuel gold's strong new bull run in addition to surging investment demand? Heavy-if-not-extreme gold-futures buying by the speculators! Over that span they added 249.2k long contracts while covering 82.8k short ones. That works out to the equivalent of 1032.6t of gold buying, nearly tripling the parallel 351.1t build in that GLD gold ETF's physical gold-bullion holdings over that same bull-market span!

Speculators' enormous gold-futures buying pushed their long contracts to an all-time record high 440.4k in early July. Right after that CoT report was published, I wrote an essay warning about the resulting record selling overhang gold faced. While that was a hardcore contrarian stance in the midst of gold's mid-summer euphoria, if speculators exited their record longs fast gold was threatened with a serious selloff.

Amazingly part of speculators' mass exodus from their excessive gold-futures longs tarried all the way until early November's presidential election! That's pretty shocking, and I never would have predicted such an unprecedented delay last summer. Overall between early July and the latest CoT report, the speculators have sold 165.1k gold-futures long contracts while adding 7.3k short ones. That's serious selling.

With each gold-futures contract controlling 100 ounces of gold, speculators have spewed the equivalent of 536.2 tonnes of gold into the markets! And much of that slammed gold almost all at once following the election surprise. Gold plunged after Trump's win because futures speculators ran for the exits. I really suspect the GLD investors wouldn't have fled in sympathy if futures speculators hadn't paved the way.

Thankfully this extreme gold-futures selling looks wildly overdone. Speculators hold only so many gold-futures long contracts, this supply of paper gold is very finite. And once all the weak-handed traders susceptible to being scared into selling low have largely exited, this extreme futures selling will dry up. As this next chart zooming in to the past year shows, odds are this gold-futures selling is exhausting itself.

After speculators' gold-futures longs hit their all-time record high in early July, they surprisingly defied the odds to hold near those levels for several more months. In the past big surges of long buying were short-lived, soon collapsing. But there was a lot of conviction gold's young bull was heading higher, so speculators were loath to sell. Until early October, when gold drifted below key $1300 support triggering stops.

Since gold futures are so hyper-leveraged, speculators must run tight stop losses so they aren't quickly wiped out when gold moves against their bets. So there was a huge cluster of long-side stops set right under $1300. As the initial stops were triggered, the resulting selling accelerated gold's losses. This in turn tripped more stops, exacerbating gold-futures selling. And the result was early October's mass stopping.

That alone was an extreme and rare event, and should've flagged a major bottom within an ongoing gold bull. And indeed it did for over a month, with gold initially grinding higher along key support at its 200-day moving average before surging into the election as Trump's perceived odds of winning grew. It's hard to believe now, but remember pre-election everyone feared a Trump win would be disastrous for stocks!

But early the morning after the election, stock-index futures started soaring. One elite multi-billionaire investor had seen stock-index futures limit-down at 5% losses, and left Trump's party to deploy $1b into stock-index futures in the middle of the night. Then Trump's victory speech was not only magnanimous, but he claimed Clinton had called and conceded. Stock futures started to soar with no contested election.

That's when the heavy gold selling started. After rocketing up nearly 5% on election night on big safe-haven buying as stock markets burned, speculators rapidly exited those gold-futures longs. In the first full CoT week after the election surprise, they dumped a staggering 45.9k long contracts or nearly 1/7th of their entire positions! That was epic, the 6th-largest long liquidation out of 933 CoT weeks since early 1999.

While that extreme mass exodus from gold-futures longs abated to just 0.6K contracts in the second CoT week after the election, it accelerated again in this latest one. That was current to November 29th, which was the newest CoT report available when this essay was published. Speculator long dumping ramped right back up to 19.0k contracts, right on the edge of the 20k+ contract single-week moves that are huge.

This resurgence in speculators dumping gold-futures longs was likely due to the outsized impact their earlier selling had on gold sentiment. Unfortunately that initial massive wave of selling in the week right after the election was wrongly interpreted at the time as gold's fundamentals deteriorating. That scared the institutional investors owning GLD shares, so they started to exit en masse on bearish futures-driven sentiment.

The heavy GLD selling during Thanksgiving week as a result of the extreme gold-futures selling the week before forced gold low enough to get the gold-futures speculators fleeing again! This is a perfect example of the selling-begets-selling vicious circle that sometimes ignites in gold. In the 3 CoT weeks reported since the election, speculators jettisoned 65.6k long contracts or nearly 1/5th of their election-day bets.

But odds are this extreme gold-futures selling is exhausting itself. Out of all the gold-futures longs the speculators added in gold's entire young bull between last December and early July, a staggering 66.3% have been unwound. Nearly 2/3rds of long-side gold-futures buying fueling 2016's gold bull has been reversed! That's staggering, leaving speculators' collective upside gold bets at 275.3k contracts per the latest read.

That's really low on multiple fronts. Speculators' gold-futures longs have never and will never retreat to zero, as there is always some base demand for leveraged gold upside. During 2015 for example, deep in a major bear where gold bearishness was epic, speculators' gold-futures longs averaged 223.2k contracts. That's only 52.0k below current levels, guaranteeing the lion's share of the selling is behind us.

Assuming 2015's average long levels will be seen again, which is very unlikely in a new gold bull, then over 3/4ths of the maximum total speculator gold-futures long selling since early July's peak upside bets is behind us! But with gold still in a new bull market despite the super-anomalous post-election plunge, longs almost certainly aren't heading all the way back to bear-market levels. That's very bullish for gold.

Speculators' collective longs have fallen to a 9.0-month low, their worst levels since early March before gold formally entered new-bull-market territory at 20% gains off last December's secular low. With such a massive retracement already, it's hard to imagine much more selling. In most futures selloffs, early selling is the strongest as stops are triggered and weak hands flee. Then selling moderates once they're out.

The only thing that could potentially trigger more meaningful speculator gold-futures long dumping is significant new gold lows. But with gold pounded to a 10.1-month low this week, its worst levels since way back in early February, fully 62.3% of this gold bull's progress has already been erased! It's difficult to conceive of enough new gold selling materializing to push this metal much lower after such colossal technical damage.

And if speculators' extreme gold-futures long selling is exhausting itself and largely over, then gold is going to stabilize if not start marching higher. That will arrest the heavy differential GLD-share selling in response to gold prices spiraling lower. So when speculators cease dumping longs, odds are gold will carve a major durable bottom. That's likely happening now, and if not almost certainly by next month at the latest.

But gold does remain at risk of more gold-futures short selling. Since early July, speculators' total shorts merely grew by 7.3k contracts. During this latest CoT week, they were only at 107.5k which isn't too far above their 95k-contract bull-market support that has held strong since April. There are a couple potential upside targets for new shorting if some catalyst spooks speculators into believing gold is heading for a fall.

The highest spec shorts have been since gold's new bull market formally began in early March is 122.7k contracts. That's only 15.2k above the latest CoT read, not enough to ignite a major new gold selloff unless all this short selling happens within an hour or so. And in 2015, that dark bear year of hyper-pessimistic gold sentiment, speculators' shorts averaged 139.6k contracts. Even those levels aren't crazy-bearish.

Getting back to there would require 32.1k contracts of new shorting, which isn't huge compared to the 172.4k contracts of gold-futures selling already suffered since early July. The main potential catalyst for big gold-futures shorting flaring again is next week's FOMC meeting. The Fed is universally expected to hike rates for the first time in a year and the second time in 10.5 years, but that rate hike won't hammer gold.

This week federal-funds futures are implying a 93% chance of a rate hike next week, and it was way up at 99% as December dawned. So a rate hike won't surprise anyone, including speculators trading gold futures. The big risk comes from the accompanying quarterly Summary of Economic Projections, which shows where top Fed officials making decisions expect the federal-funds rate to be in the coming years.

The last SEP, or "dot plot", in late September showed Fed officials forecasting two rate hikes in 2017. Gold could see significant futures short selling if that increases to three. But if the Fed indeed hikes next week, it will have to be super-dovish in the rest of its communications to avoid spooking stock markets. Thus it's unlikely a hawkish SEP would be published the same day, greatly lessening the downside risk to gold.

Soon speculators and investors alike will realize how radically oversold gold is, and how anomalous its extreme post-election selloff was. These record-high stock markets literally trading at bubble valuations remain overdue to roll over into a new bear no matter what Trump does. And his proposed tax cuts and big government spending will ignite serious inflation. All of that is very bullish for gold investment demand!

While investors can certainly play the coming resumption of gold's young bull in that leading GLD gold ETF, individual gold stocks will really amplify gold's gains. While gold powered about 30% higher in the first half of 2016, the leading gold-stock index nearly tripled with a 182% gain! These huge gains were only reaped by smart contrarians willing to fight the crowd and buy low a year ago. The same is true today.

The bottom line is speculators' extreme gold-futures selling has been the dominant driver of gold's steep post-election plunge. Their near-record rush for the exits blasted gold lower so fast that investors were spooked into fleeing. But speculators' epic futures long liquidation that crushed gold sure looks to be exhausting itself. So many gold-futures longs have been dumped that there simply aren't many left to sell.

And once speculators' aggressive gold-futures selling ceases, gold prices will stabilize which will arrest the parallel investor selling. That decisive bottoming will pave the way for gold's young bull market to resume. Investors will soon realize their radical underinvestment in gold isn't very wise, especially with wildly-overvalued stock markets trading at euphoric record highs. New investment demand will propel gold far higher.

Finland's first solar power investment fund set up by Evli and Nordic Shine

Finnish Evli Bank has become the majority shareholder in Finnish solar company Nordic Shine, as the two companies combine to create the country's first ever solar investment fund, to expand the possibilities of distributed solar within the country.

Solar has yet to take off in Finland. A handful of rooftop systems and community solar projects make up the entire market, but with Finland's first ever solar investment fund for distributed solar being launched, solar deployment may be about to pick up.

The fund, EAI SOLAR I limited partnership, is being launched by Evli and Nordic Shine, and will offer property owners and tenants the opportunity to invest in distributed solar projects without releasing too much of their own capital. It is also open to investors, who are seeking a stable return on solar investments.

With existing experience in the market, Nordic Shine will take care of operation and maintenance of the PV arrays throughout the contract period. Major Finnish property management firm, Ovenia Group, has already agreed to offer the fund's model to its clients.

"Our service model enables transparent allocation of the benefits of solar power between the tenant and the owner regardless of property's lease agreement type," said Nordic Shine's partner Jussi Vimpari.

The aim of the fund is simple, it wants to increase solar deployment in Finland, and offer the public a means to adopt the clean energy technology. On top of that, it believes that distributed solar systems will help property owners reduce electricity costs, and reduce their environmental impact.

"The utilization of solar power in Finland has been slowed down by lack of financing alternative," commented Evli Alternative Investments Managing Director Tero Tuominen. "The fund offers a new finance and service model for distributed power production, which has substantially accelerated solar power investments."

Community PV projects already makes up a substantial 13% of Finland's entire solar power production. Outside of that, utility-scale PV is non-existent, as the largest installation to date is just 850 kW. However, this new fund is a step in the right direction, and may begin a trend of solar adoption within the country.

Germany's massive nuclear fusion reactor is actually working

A little over a year ago, Germany turned on the world’s largest nuclear fusion reactor and faced sharp speculation over whether the machine could function as intended. Now, tests conducted by US and German researchers confirm that the experimental Wendelstein 7-X (W7-X) stellarator is indeed producing magnetic fields that make controlled nuclear reactions possible, and with a high degree of accuracy and incredibly low error rate. With these test results, new confidence and hope are spreading through the renewable energy industry, as nuclear fusion could be the key to ending fossil fuel dependence worldwide.

W7-X is the first of its kind to be put into regular operation. Its processes mimic those that occur on the sun, which is a natural nuclear fusion reactor (or “stellarator”). A team of researchers from the US and Germany worked together to test the stellarator after it went online in order to learn whether it is capable of producing the sort of magnetic fields necessary to trap scorching balls of plasma long enough for nuclear fusion to occur. And it is.

Related: Germany’s Wendelstein 7-X stellarator passes new test, bringing us closer to nuclear fusion energy

The research team found that W7-X is generating magnetic fields just the way its design intended: strong, twisted, and 3D. “To our knowledge, this is an unprecedented accuracy, both in terms of the as-built engineering of a fusion device, as well as in the measurement of magnetic topology,” the researchers wrote in a report. Combined with an error rate less than one in 100,000, the tests conclude the W7-X stellarator has made history. It could become the first power plant on Earth to use little more than saltwater to create a safe, clean, long-lasting source of energy for generations to come.

Electronic Scrap Recycling Market - Advance Technology Evolve in E-Waste Recycling Trends in Future

This report aims to provide a comprehensive strategic analysis of the global electronic scrap recycling market along with revenue and growth forecasts for the period from 2013 to 2022. The proliferation of computing and electronic devices such as smartphones, computers, tablets, televisions, small home appliances, digital cameras, music players, and laptops; shorter product lifecycles; and government legislations governing electronic waste (e-waste) are major factors influencing the electronic scrap recycling market. Hardly any electronic and electrical product does not contain metals or is not dependent on metals for its manufacturing. In e-waste recycling, damaged and unusable electronic and electrical products are processed and the metals they contain are extracted for use in new products.

Electronic and electrical products are progressively part of our life. In order to ensure that they have only a minimum impact on environment, end-of-life electronic products must be processed and the metals they contain must be recycled. The total volume of e-waste is increasing globally, but the number of smelters available to process it is very small.

In recent years, collected and scrapped electronic products have accounted for the largest increase in material type, primarily in the form of printed circuit boards (PCBs) from mobile phones and computers. Boliden Group (Boliden Rönnskär) has been melting out different types of recycling materials since 1960. The company owns technologies developed in-house, as well as an extensive capacity to process different type of materials.

This research study on the global electronic scrap recycling market provides a detailed analysis of how recycling and smelting companies in different regions are using electronic scrap for the extraction of different types of ferrous, non-ferrous, and precious metals from electronic scrap. The report offers an in-depth study of the market drivers, restraints, and growth opportunities. Using these factors, the report identifies various trends expected to impact the market during the forecast period from 2015 to 2022. The report includes a comprehensive coverage of the underlying economic, environmental, and technological factors influencing the electronic scrap recycling market.

It provides the competitive landscape of key players in the electronic recycling market in order to highlight the state of competition therein. The report also provides a detailed competitive analysis of the key players in electronic recycling and identifies various business strategies adopted by them. The study explains the penetration of each market segment within various geographies, and how these segments have accelerated the growth of electronic recycling market.

Interpret a Competitive outlook Analysis Report with PDF Brochure:

Based on the materials extracted, the electronic recycling market is segmented into ferrous, non-ferrous, and precious metals. Based on the type of electronic products, the market is segmented into IT, office equipment, and handheld devices; large electronic appliances; small household appliances; and other appliances.

The office, IT equipment, and handheld devices segment consists of computers, laptops, smartphones, tablets and other office related electronic equipment. The large electronic appliances comprises televisions, refrigerators, air conditioners, video, audio equipment and other equipment. Small household appliances include toasters, vacuum cleaners, and coffee machines and other appliances. The others segment includes lighting, electric fittings, and automotive equipment. The report aims to provide a comprehensive, cross-sectional analysis of the electronic scrap recycling market across major geographies such as North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, the Middle East and Africa, and Latin America.

The report includes an overview of the market strategies, annual revenues, and the recent developments of key companies operating in the market. The key market participants profiled in this study include Boliden Group, Umicore N.V., Dowa Holdings Co., Ltd., Ultromex Ltd., LS-Nikko Copper Inc., Glencore Xstrata Plc, Enviro-Hub Holdings Ltd., Outotec Oyj, Mitsui & Co., Ltd., Mitsubishi Materials USA Corporation, Aurubis AG, and JX Nippon Mining and Metal Corporation.

The report provides a comprehensive analysis of the raw materials feed, smelting, and refining processes pertaining to the recycling of electronic scrap offered by these leading players. Information on research and development activities, business processes, and upcoming technologies for the extraction of various metals from electronic waste is also included in the report.

Ucore Rare Metals, Able to Produce Critical Metals & REE in the US

Ucore Rare Metals [TSX-V: UCU] / [OTC: UURAF] continues to make confident strides in the commercialization of its Molecular Recognition Technology ("MRT") platform, contained in an enterprise to be co-owned between Ucore and IBC Advanced Technologies, Inc. Key to the enterprise is that it has exclusive rights to deploy the entire SuperLig®/MRT catalogue of metals separation products to monetize tailings applications anywhere in the world, in addition to mining and recycling applications in the REE and PGM sectors.

With over 60 SuperLig® products already developed for a wide range of metals, the opportunity is a large one, and Ucore is pursuing a technology licensing plan to get MRT in to the maximum number of applications. Diverse applications include inserting MRT directly into operating facilities (and/or bolting MRT onto the back-end waste handling function), recycling, remediation and, "urban mining," which entails separating high-value metals ("HVMs") such as Heavy REEs, PGMs, lithium, cobalt and tungsten.

There are a handful of mission critical REE, green energy & high-tech metals that could become difficult to reliably secure under certain adverse circumstances. Some examples from my review of various (mostly government agency) reports, the REEs dysprosium, yttrium, erbium, europium, terbium pop up a lot. Oil was of crucial importance in last century's wars, will electric battery components and REE be this century's show stoppers? It's no secret that in addition to an insatiable need for various REE, the U.S. Department of Defense ("DOD") is front and center in the analysis and adoption of EVs for military, national defense, homeland security & communications activities.

In addition to its broader vision to license MRT technology in to multiple metals sectors, Ucore has a near term agenda focused on accessing some of the highest demand HVMs in the U.S. On November 15th, the Company announced it has engaged in planning & development of a Strategic Metals Complex ("SMC"), capitalizing on the MRT platform developed for the recently completed SuperLig One pilot plant in Salt Lake City. The SMC will be a commercial production plant designed to separate feedstock containing critical rare earth elements /metals ("REE") (e.g., dysprosium, neodymium, terbium), and PGMs (rhodium, palladium & platinum).

This is proof that Ucore is ready to roll, detailed engineering work is well underway. Initial feedstock is expected to be sourced from, "recycling, swarf and tailings-generation partners in the automotive and REE permanent magnet industries." Ucore technology partner IBC has extensive experience in this area, for instance in PGM applications used successfully by operators such as Impala Platinum in South Africa. The potential economics for MRT plant placements are impressive. Based on my experience with similar licensing platform agreements, annual royalty fees of between 2% and 5% are fairly common. That, and an upfront licensing fee, plant design & maintenance fees, and recurring revenue from the sale of proprietary materials and services. In my opinion, mandates with large companies like Teck Resources (NYSE: TCK) could easily have Net Present Values in the tens of millions of dollars.

President/CEO & Director Jim McKenzie commented,

"Our pilot facility provides a blueprint for construction of a new generation of SuperLig® separation facilities to add to already-existing MRT installations around the globe. This Strategic Metals Complex represents not just a transition by Ucore towards near-term production and revenue, it represents a reaction to a very real domestic need for high-purity energy metals. In turn, the SMC represents a significant progression for Ucore, capitalizing on the innovative design of SuperLig®-One, and leveraging this platform in to full scale production."

My interest in Ucore is reinvigorated. Simply stated, MRT is faster, less energy intensive, generates fewer emissions and waste, does not use solvents or toxic chemicals, has a smaller surface and environmental footprint, requires less cap-ex and will enjoy lower op-ex. Now here's where things get more interesting. While an important theme underpinning Ucore remains the same, I believe it takes on new urgency with the election of Donald Trump. That theme being- Security of Supply of indispensable REE and critical green energy / high-tech metals. Few may realize that China not only controls, but completely dominates, the global supply of rare earth oxides, includes mining, processing & refining.

It's reported that over 95% of pure, separated REE produced last year were in China, REE in the hardware and software applications enabling National & Homeland Security and the capability of conducting both offensive and defensive military operations.

In addition to the paramount importance of knowing where one's electricity, food & water come from, and the risk of supply disruptions therein, knowing which REE and other HVMs our modern society cannot live without, is necessary and prudent. In World Wars I & II, people knew exactly which materials were essential to the war effort, tin, rubber, aluminum & steel, among others.... Does the West need to enter into a "hot" war to learn which metals are in fact critical?

Which critical metals will be most vulnerable to steady, secure supply to the U.S. DOD and DOE?

Am I being alarmist with the talk of WW III? Perhaps, but no matter what the future holds, I think that Ucore Rare Metals is well positioned to thrive in a world becoming more dangerous and more dependent on technology, with no end in sight. Investment funding for companies like Ucore are increasingly becoming available, for example this "Innovation Summit" organized by "America's largest angel investment fund, representing over $2.5 billion in early-stage, high-risk technology funding..."

Regardless of what readers think of Mr. Trump, he has explicitly stated things that favor larger military budgets. Without further commentary, here is what he has said, 1) Japan and Korea should strongly consider defending themselves 2) western Europe is not paying nearly enough for the military protection provided by the U.S. 3) given items 1, & 2, the belief that the military has been meaningfully underfunded and is in desperate need of a face lift. In addition to National Defense considerations, remember that Trump is gunning for China as well.

A larger U.S. military budget correlates well with larger military expenditures around the world. That's why a group of 6 well known military and homeland security stocks including Raytheon (NYSE: RTN), Lockheed Martin (NYSE: LMT), Harris Corp (NYSE: HRS) L-3 Communications (NYSE: LLL), Rockwell Collins (NYSE: COL) and General Dynamics (NYSE: GD) is up 15% since November 8th, vs. the S&P500, up 4%. Why should it be any different for Ucore, on the leading edge of new, green, high-tech platforms that will shape global geopolitics and our technology paradigm for decades?

Finally, readers might recall that President-elect Trump said he will designate China a "currency manipulator," and slap a 45% tariff on Chinese imports. Given that country's giant pile of U.S. Treasuries, and its control and utter dominance of all things REE, a trade war with China could be a dangerous undertaking.

As has been reported in detail by Ucore, REE and hard to replace or substitute HVMs are essential ingredients in a large and growing number of DOD & Department of Energy ("DOE") applications, not to mention in mining and industrial settings. Also contained in prior Ucore press releases is evidence that its MRT platform has been proven and independently verified, at pilot scale and ready for production scale in the near future.

What makes MRT superior to other proposed solutions? Relying heavily on last century's separation technologies like solvent extraction is an ill-advised and increasingly non-viable strategy, especially in China. It's impossible to ignore the horrendous air and water pollution, perhaps the worst on the planet, in Chinese cities. Not only is China de-emphasizing coal and going all-in on nuclear power, it already leads the world in wind and solar power and the electrification of its transportation sector. MRT is not only greener, it will deliver desperately needed security of supply to global end users, especially in the U.S.

Just-in-time processing and supply chains are the norm. Turning complex facilities and integrated systems off, and on, is time consuming, costly and introduces unnecessary operating risks. It's alarming that U.S. agencies, both inside and out of the DOD, not to mention powerful industry trade associations, have failed to address this critically important issue. The ongoing failure to obtain some semblance of security of supply is a clear and present danger.

Conclusion

The implications for REE mining and production outside of China, are profound. Ucore Rare Metals [TSX-V: UCU] / [OTC: UURAF] is in a prime position to 1) benefit from higher REE & HVM prices 2) be part of the solution of the rallying cry for security of supply, and 3) address increasing demand for products and technologies that accelerate the game-changing shift away from fossil fuels.

All roads lead to greater use of select metals like the ones mentioned, but also greater use of metals that galvanize steel and can be used in next generation alloys. However, perhaps most important to recognize, is that some of the REE/HVMs most in demand and most difficult to secure in the future, might not be on anyone's radar screen today. That's why the flexibility afforded by over 60 SuperLig® products embedded into Ucore's flagship enterprise with IBC on MRT is an increasingly important and valuable asset.

End note: Hiding in plain sight, China's monopoly on critical REE is a well-researched and reported topic.

ThreeConsulting.com Article April, 2016

BreakingDefense.com Article March, 2016

Russia Direct Article February, 2016

U.S. Government Accountability Office Report February, 2016

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At the time this article was posted, Peter Epstein owned shares in Ucore Rare Metals and the Company was a sponsor of Epstein Research. Readers understand and agree that they must conduct their own due diligence above and beyond reading this article. While the author believes he's diligent in screening out companies that, for any reasons, are unattractive investment opportunities, he cannot guarantee that his efforts will (or have been) successful. Mr. Epstein & [ER] are not responsible for any perceived, or actual, errors including, but not limited to, commentary, opinions, views, assumptions, reported facts & financial calculations, or for the completeness of this article.

Retrace, a Xinova Spinout, Provides Data to Improve E-Waste Recycling

For all of its noble goals, the business of recycling old electronics and mobile phones is fraught with challenges and not very profitable. Retrace, a Seattle startup that spun out of Xinova earlier this fall, believes providing better data to recyclers and other players in the global market for used mobile phones will help.

"It's not necessarily as clean and green as everyone seems to think it is," says Michael Rubel, founder and president of Retrace. "Even the good players struggle with the compliance measures and it's a tough game, even for the big guys."

Xinova, formerly known as the Invention Development Fund, rebranded itself this fall as it completed its spin off from Bellevue, WA-based Intellectual Ventures, the patent aggregator and multifaceted invention shop of former Microsoft CTO Nathan Myhrvold. A mashup of the words for new in Chinese and Latin, Xinova is pursuing a new model for uniting research and development with commercialization in industries including IT, agriculture, and manufacturing. It connects its customers - ranging from startups to Fortune 500 companies - to a network of 10,000 experts in more than 30 countries to define and solve problems, and make better products and services.

The company, based in Bellevue with offices in Japan, Korea, China, India, Singapore, Australia, Germany, and Israel, spun out other startups including Coffee Flour, which is commercializing a byproduct of coffee production, and QSense, which makes technology to monitor and share air quality information. (We'll hear more about Xinova from executive vice president and head of global partnerships Paul Levins at Xconomy Intersect on Thursday. Learn more and register here.)

At Retrace, Rubel took a circuitous path to the business of providing phone makers, recyclers, brokers, and mobile carriers with data on flows of second-hand phones from one market to the next.

After a career as a Naval officer and nearly eight years working on innovation programs at Michelin, Rubel found himself at an Austin, TX, based e-waste recycler. He helped the company restructure, raise funding, and obtain certification from Sustainable Electronics Recycling International. He thought things were being done the right way, he says. They weren't.

"They were basically taking bad electronic waste, putting it in the back of a shipping container, filling the front end of it with teddy bears and cute little things that no one would ever notice and shipping it off to China and just not telling me about what they were doing," he says.

Several U.S. e-waste handlers were caught shipping e-waste to junkyards in places like Hong Kong and elsewhere in Asia that have weaker protections from the environmental and health impacts of scrapping old computer monitors, printers, and the like. The Seattle-based Basel Action Network (BAN) sniffed out the practice, which ran counter to assurances consumers were given about e-waste recycling, through the e-Trash Transparency Project, revealed last May.

After discovering the practice at the Austin company, Rubel resigned. But he still felt drawn to the e-waste recycling business. He founded Second Wave Recycling, which recycles a couple thousand donated phones each month, giving the proceeds to charities. While there, he was invited to review Intellectual Ventures' portfolio of intellectual property related to recycling. He ended up becoming an entrepreneur in residence at IV and began working on what would become Retrace.

The company's original idea was an e-waste marketplace to "to bring more transparency and efficiency to an otherwise struggling market," Rubel says. "Everyone needs to audit everyone else and so this whole audit trail - even though a good thing on one hand - really kept anyone from doing any business efficiently using technology. It was still very old-school. [You] have to fill out paperwork. It's got the little carbon copy underneath it."

Retrace decided to focus specifically on cell phones.

"Arguably cell phones are growing a lot quicker than any other e-waste category," Rubel says. "There's more value there. There's more trade internationally because they're lighter weight."

BAN says a million cell phones can yield as much as 20,000 pounds of copper, 550 pounds of silver, 50 pounds of gold, and 20 pounds of palladium. Smartphones in particular are often resold to consumers in emerging markets.

The biggest value Retrace saw in its marketplace was the data.

"I was watching the transactions go around the world and we saw pricing, we saw trade, we saw volume, and we saw models," Rubel says, adding, "This is a commodity, just like any other product."

The company now provides that data and analysis to customers throughout the phone recycling and resale supply chain.

"We're working on the ability to predict the future as far as what will happen when they launch the iPhone 8, where the best price is, and where the phones are going," he says.

Rubel credits Xinova for incubating Retrace as it sorted out its technology and business model - even though the business Retrace landed on doesn't use any of the initial intellectual property - and also with honing his skills as an entrepreneur. Before pitching investors, he practiced with the Xinova team members, many of whom have venture or corporate investing experience, and received "oftentimes brutal and honest" feedback.

That paid off when he went to pitch his business. Last month, the company announced that WaterStone Capital, an early stage venture firm with offices in Seattle, Beijing, and Shanghai, acquired a controlling stake in Retrace and paired it up with Miao Miao Cloud, a Chinese tech company that was also building a marketplace for mobile phone resales. The combination creates a global marketplace for second-hand phones and expands Retrace's market for its analytics tools.

Rubel says that a more efficient marketplace could help increase phone recycling rates.

"More consumers will want to recycle their phones because they'll realize there's more money in it when the carriers pull it from them," he says.

Egypt's latest vision for e-waste management

 Egypt's latest vision for e-waste management

Maybe it's broken and cannot be fixed. Maybe it costs more to maintain than to replace. Or maybe it's just old and you have bought a newer model. Either way, what do you do with electrical and electronic goods once you decide to get rid of them?

Here comes Dr. WEEE, a company specialised in electronic waste recycling. Its business model is designed to meet all market needs related to e-waste management. The company provides a comprehensive e-waste management service. They collect, sort, dismantle, and recycle as much of the components as possible while ensuring that the process from start to finish is as environmentally friendly as possible. The company also sells electronics-related products, such as ink cartridges, produced from recycled components.

According to Esam Hashim, co-founder of Dr. WEEE, every stage in the process has a business opportunity. He explained that Egypt forms the largest e-waste market in Africa and the Middle East, yet despite this he said most companies working in the field do not understand how to properly dispose of e-waste. "Companies that work with e-waste in Egypt use an old-fashioned way of extracting precious components, and their way of getting rid of dangerous components harms the environment," he said.

According to Hashim, many of these companies do not know that many of the components that can be extracted from e-waste are valuable - such as gold, silver, copper, platinum, titanium, copper, and iron - and instead due to a lack of knowledge and technology extract only copper and iron.

Dr. WEEE divides these components into three categories: base metals such as iron, copper, and steel; precious metals such as gold, palladium, and platinum; and hazardous components such as lead, cadmium, and batteries.

Rather than attempt to extract and separate these components, many e-waste management companies dispose of their waste by burning it, Hashim said, adding that older e-waste contains more precious metals than modern appliances and devices.

At first, the company tried to persuade Egyptians that they should bring their e-waste to them in order to be able to dispose of it in a way that mitigated the health and environmental risk factors; however, Hashim noted that the overall response was unenthusiastic.

When Dr. WEEE initially had trouble collecting e-waste, the company had settled to purchase such waste from individuals and companies alike. This eventually became a successful strategy for the company. Hashim said that most of the e-waste they receive comes from individuals and the private sector rather than government institutions.

For an older-generation mobile phone the company pays EGP15-20. Newer phones fetch EGP 30, and laptops can be traded in for EGP 25. Old monitors or televisions can be sold to the company for EGP 20-30.

Egypt is currently the largest market in both the Middle East and Africa. Producing approximately 370,000 tonnes in 2014, Hashim believes the country's share of e-waste will continue to grow.

The United Nations University study said South Africa is second on the continent, producing 350,000 tonnes in 2014, followed by Nigeria which produced 220,000 tonnes that same year.

Following their success in Egypt, the company has since established a franchise with a different model for every stage of the operation. Dr. WEEE now also operates in Lebanon, Jordan, Saudi Arabi, and the United Arab Emirates.

Hashim said that the company prepared many turnkey solutions in order to achieve the highest quality and to maximise profits.

The annual global volume of the e-waste generation is expected to reach 93.5m tonnes in 2016, according to a new report from Research and Markets. This estimate is more than double the 41.5m tonnes generated in 2011.

Hashim also said that global revenue generated from the sale and processing of end-of-life electronics is projected to double from its current $9.15bn per year to over $20bn over the next five years.

According to UNEP estimates, only 15-20% of e-waste is recycled, the rest goes directly into landfills and incinerators.

"Electronics recycling is now the fastest growing segment of the recycling industry," Hashim noted.

In terms of the company's vision for the future, Hashim said he wants to move forward in a way that maximises production efficiency, while also taking into account the environment and sustainability.

He believes that their technology is part of this belief that ensures that the company's products, employees and suppliers follow socially responsible business practices aimed at environmental preservation and sustainability.

"Through our experience in the field of waste management and business franchising, sharing our experience and technology with our clients is a win-win situation, especially in the most rapidly growing segment of the recycling industry," Hashim added.

While the company has expanded into other markets, Hashim noted that the company does not yet provide full services in their franchises outside of Egypt.

He noted that Egypt doesn't have the technology required to recycle all extracted components, and so the company's main target is to export their extracts to foreign countries.

Going green to make some green

Dr. WEEE still faces many obstacles, such as the establishment of collection points across the world and access to the latest technologies. Personnel training and awareness campaigns are therefore very important in order to continue being effective and profitable.

In order to raise awareness, the company promotes e-waste recycling in schools and private sector companies by holding environmental awareness campaigns. Hashim said he welcomed the government's receptive attitude towards the company's vision, saying they have signed an agreement with the Ministry of Environment and the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology to create a standard and set criteria for the best way to extract precious metals and export them.

Ultimately, Hashim says he wants to change consumer patterns from the current intensive consumption based model to more environmentally sustainable consumption habits. He believes his company can provide the model and motivation to help the informal waste management sector become more environmentally conscious, reducing the health risks while also increasing their profits.

By educating others on proper methods of e-waste disposal and recycling, companies can turn a bigger profit and contribute to improving the environment.