As the country's policy support for new energy vehicles and wind power industries continues to increase, the field of new energy vehicles will directly drive the demand for high-performance neodymium-iron-boron, and neodymium-iron-boron magnets ushered in important development opportunities. Industry experts predict that the demand for neodymium-iron-boron will reach 126,000 tons in 2014, a year-on-year increase of about 15%. Recently, the operating rate of neodymium-iron-boron production enterprises has continued to rise, and the major production enterprises have reached more than 80%. In August of this year, Hu Boping, senior vice president of the third ring of China Science and Technology, said that the demand for neodymium iron boron has improved this year, and the company's operating rate is above 80%. In particular, the capacity utilization rate of high-performance neodymium-iron-boron reached more than 85%, and basically reached full production. The company is bullish on automotive applications. Ningbo Yunsheng also said that the company has some orders for neodymium iron boron magnetic materials in the field of new energy vehicles and high-speed rail, but it is still relatively small, and the operating rate is also above 80%. Zhenghai Magnetic Materials revealed that the company's current operating rate is around 85%.

 

   Due to the continuous increase in the operating rate of many neodymium-iron-boron manufacturers and the new production capacity being put into operation, the demand for neodymium-neodymium-rhodium by the neodymium-iron-boron producers continued to improve and increased. High-end neodymium-iron-boron requires a large amount of heavy rare-earth europium or dysprosium. As the temperature rises, the magnetic properties of neodymium-iron-boron will sharply degrade. At present, the increase of coercive force mainly depends on heavy rare-earth europium and europium. At present, the demand for tritium oxide of a company of Zhongke Sanyuan has exceeded 250 tons, and Ningbo Yunsheng also exceeded 100 tons. At the same time, according to statistics from relevant agencies, currently China's plutonium reserves are only about 60,000 tons, the annual demand exceeds 1,500 tons, and the useful life is less than 40 years.

 

   In summary, with the increase in the operating rate of NdFeB enterprises, the demand for heavy rare earth dysprosium and thorium is expected to gradually increase in the second half of the year and continue to grow. Heavy rare-earth europium and thorium have limited resources. The current market price of thorium oxide is 1.4 to 1.5 million yuan / ton. It is only 10% of thorium oxide 13 million / ton in 2011, and the price is at a historically low level. The value of thorium oxide investment deserves long-term attention.