Federal Treasurer Jim Chalmers has ordered six companies to divest their holdings in Northern Minerals, a rare earths mining company, within two weeks, marking the government's third intervention to protect strategic control over resources essential to clean energy and defense technologies. The move underscores growing concerns that foreign investors may be attempting to circumvent Australia's national interest protections in the critical minerals sector.
The six investors—Hong Kong Ying Tak Ltd, Real International Resources Ltd, Qogir Trading & Service Co Ltd, Chuanyou Cong, Vastness Investment Group Ltd, and Zhongxiong Lin—collectively hold around 17 per cent of the company. A spokesman for Mr Chalmers said the decision was entirely consistent with advice from Treasury and the Foreign Investment Review Board and was about protecting the national interest and ensuring compliance with the foreign investment framework.
Pattern of Attempted Control
This represents the third time the government has intervened over ownership concerns tied to Chinese-linked investors in Northern Minerals. In 2023, Mr Chalmers blocked a Chinese-linked investment vehicle, Yuxiao Fund, from increasing its stake in the company. The year after, he ordered another five China-linked companies to divest from it. Earlier this year, the Foreign Investment Review Board wrote to Northern Minerals saying it believed three of the blocked investors had breached that order by transferring their shares to Hong Kong Ying Tak Ltd, one of the six companies ordered to divest today.
The spokesman said, "We operate a robust and non-discriminatory foreign investment framework, and will take further action if required to protect our national interest in relation to this matter."
Strategic Minerals at Stake
Northern Minerals is trying to develop its Browns Range Heavy Rare Earths Project in the East Kimberley, with hopes of producing large quantities of dysprosium and terbium, which are critical elements for the magnets used for military, computing and clean energy technologies. The company operates the Browns Range mine in Western Australia and the Browns Range pilot plant is located in the remote East Kimberley near the Northern Territory border.
Northern Minerals is also seen as a key player in efforts by both the United States and Australia to break China's stranglehold on the critical minerals supply chain and is already on track for about $500 million in funding from the Export Import Bank of the United States.
Corporate Governance Concerns
One of the Chinese investors ordered to sell its shares, the Beijing-based Vastness Investment Group, tried to topple the company's chairman before abandoning its bid earlier this year. Northern Minerals has delayed its annual meeting as it tries to resolve the identity of its shareholders. The company has entered a trading halt and said in a statement to the ASX that it was currently considering the treasurer's orders and would make a further announcement once it had done so.
The ABC said it had tried to contact the six investors ordered to divest their shares but had so far been unable to reach any of them.
Expert Analysis
John Coyne from the Australian Strategic Policy Institute said the government "appears to have concluded" that several China-based investors have "ignored repeated direction, and it has acted accordingly and appropriately". He said, "It sends an important signal that Australia is far more willing to use investment policy as a tool of economic security."
Dr Coyne also said, "Australia has been very clear for several years that critical minerals are no longer simply a commercial issue. They now sit at the centre of strategic competition, industrial resilience and economic security."
Why This Matters:
The repeated attempts to circumvent Australian investment controls reveal the vulnerability of democratic nations' strategic resources to foreign influence when regulatory frameworks lack robust enforcement. Northern Minerals' rare earths are essential for the clean energy transition and defense capabilities that protect both economic and national security. The company's potential $500 million in U.S. funding reflects international recognition that diversifying critical mineral supply chains away from monopolistic control is vital for technological sovereignty and climate action. The government's willingness to enforce divestment orders three times signals that protecting public interest in strategic resources requires sustained institutional vigilance, not merely initial regulatory barriers. As global competition intensifies over materials essential to decarbonization and modern defense, democratic oversight of foreign investment becomes inseparable from energy security, industrial policy, and the protection of shared strategic interests.