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What they make, where they produce, the materials that matter — then what is coming, what it would do to the business, and the moves available. Sector: mining metals. Company profile →
Samancor Chrome is a private South African mining group and the world's largest integrated ferrochrome producer, with roughly 2.4 million tonnes/year of ferrochrome capacity plus over 0.5 million tonnes/year of specialty-grade chrome ore sales.
It mines chrome ore at two complexes — Western Chrome Mines (Rustenburg, North West) and Eastern Chrome Mines (Steelpoort, Limpopo) — and smelts it into ferrochrome at six South African works: Ferrometals (Emalahleni), Middelburg Ferrochrome, Tubatse Ferrochrome/Tubatse Alloy (Steelpoort), Dikwena Chrome (Brits — the former Hernic Ferrochrome mines and furnaces, acquired out of business rescue effective 1 November 2019), and TC Smelter (Mooinooi). The company traces to a 1975 merger of SA Manganese Ltd and Amcor Ltd; its manganese division was unbundled in 2005 and Samancor Chrome today mines and smelts chrome only. Ownership is private: Africa Chrome Limited holds the majority stake, alongside a Japanese consortium (Hanwa/Jogmec) and Black Economic Empowerment shareholders.
Verbatim from the dossier's “What they do” section — sources on the company profile.
This is where Samancor Chrome Holdings (Pty) Ltd produces — approximate output shares from its dossier — not where it sells. Sales geography is not yet in our corpus for any company, so we cannot compute exposure to measures that bite on where products ship: an extraterritorial re-export rule follows the shipment and its material content, not the factory. Where such a measure touches its materials, the policy sections below flag it — but its sales-side incidence is not computable yet, and we say so rather than substitute the production map for it.
Of everything in its products, we track the critical inputs — the materials whose supply is concentrated in few countries, policy-exposed, or hard to substitute — because those are the ones a single measure can move. Each carries its role in the product, quoted from the dossier's own exposure note.
Silicon (byproduct/secondary product line) — the TC Smelter (Mooinooi) also produces ferrosilicon, a silicon-rich alloy sold into steelmaking. This is a secondary product line alongside the core ferrochrome business, not a bulk input Samancor sources.
Chromium (structural component / core product) — Samancor's entire business is chrome ore mining and ferrochrome smelting; chromium is not an input it sources but the commodity it produces and sells. South Africa holds the large majority of the world's chrome ore reserves and ferrochrome smelting capacity, and chromium has no substitute in stainless steel or superalloy production — S…
Scope. The non-critical remainder of the bill of materials — structural steel, polymers, glass and the like — is not tracked here because it is not supply-constrained: this section covers the constrained inputs, which is where policy risk concentrates, not a full bill of materials.
The top 5 are ranked mechanically — what the instrument does (its transmission class: an export ban is not a reporting duty), × how close to law (stage-derived likelihood band, never a probability) × how much of your tracked bill of materials it touches. Each unfolds as a chain: trigger → what it hits → the response the instrument actually calls for. A measure touching a material you produce can be an opportunity, not a threat.
ZA · stage passed-committee → elevated likelihood · touches chromium · flagged 15 Jun 2026, 114d pending
If enacted, chrome ore export tax and/or quota would disrupt South Africa's ~2. 4 Mt/yr chrome ore export stream (≈45% of global seaborne supply); beneficiation licensing conditions attached to mineral rights allocations would require FTSE/JSE-listed chrome miners (Samancor/Merafe, Assore, Glencore) to build local ferrochrome and stainless-steel capacity before new rights are allocated; PGMs and other minerals may follow chrome as the test-case model, expanding scope to the full South African mining portfolio
source ↗Chromium (structural component / core product) — Samancor's entire business is chrome ore mining and ferrochrome smelting; chromium is not an input it sources but the commodity it produces and sells. South Africa holds the large majority of the world's chrome ore reserves and ferrochrome smelting capacity, and chromium has no substitute in stainless steel or superalloy production — S…
This changes the form of what South Africa exports, not whether you can buy: raw/unprocessed exports are restricted while domestically processed material stays available — that is the measure's own mechanism. Your South Africa-origin raw feed becomes processed-only; the route is a value-added purchase or a South Africa processing partner, not a supplier switch.
chromium — you sit on the supply side: a measure tightening others' supply pushes buyers toward you, so your move is positioning, not substitution (chokepoint page).
KZ · stage passed-vote → high likelihood · touches chromium · flagged 29 Jun 2026, 100d pending
Senate-approved package of amendments to Kazakhstan's Code on Subsoil and Subsoil Use (No. 125-VI ZRK): (1) raises the mandatory local (domestic) content share in works and services from 50% to 70% during exploration and extraction of solid minerals INCLUDING URANIUM — a material new in-country-value obligation on the world's #1 uranium producer (Kazatomprom) and its JV partners (Cameco, Orano, CGN/CNNC, Uranium One); (2) digitises geological data and expands electronic auctions for granting subsoil-use rights; (3) grants strategic investors implementing large industrial/innovation projects (>14. 5M MCI) a priority right to explore and extract solid minerals. Re-prices the cost base and access regime for Kazakh uranium, copper, chromium and the country's emerging rare-earth deposits.
source ↗Chromium (structural component / core product) — Samancor's entire business is chrome ore mining and ferrochrome smelting; chromium is not an input it sources but the commodity it produces and sells. South Africa holds the large majority of the world's chrome ore reserves and ferrochrome smelting capacity, and chromium has no substitute in stainless steel or superalloy production — S…
The filed text doesn't state this instrument's mechanism clearly enough to classify, so we don't guess a response — the measure text above is the read.
chromium — you sit on the supply side: a measure tightening others' supply pushes buyers toward you, so your move is positioning, not substitution (chokepoint page).
JP · stage awaiting-signature → high likelihood · touches chromium · flagged 29 Jun 2026, 100d pending
Japan's METI + MOF made an affirmative PRELIMINARY determination in an anti-dumping investigation (initiated 22 Jul 2025 on an application from Nippon Steel, Nippon Yakin Kogyo, NAS Stainless Steel Strip and Nippon Kinzoku) into nickel-added cold-rolled stainless steel coil, sheet and strip originating in the People's Republic of China and the separate customs territory of Taiwan (Penghu, Kinmen, Matsu); Trade Minister Ryosei Akazawa indicated provisional duties of ~45% on Chinese product and ~21% on Taiwanese product, expected to take effect as soon as July 2026. On 19 Jun 2026 METI/MOF EXTENDED the investigation period by four months to 21 Nov 2026 (final determination pending). IPTM relevance: (1) a RARE Japan-issuer trade remedy — JP has ZERO trade-remedy actions on the register and seldom uses AD, so a Japanese AD wall is a notable issuer + instrument-bloc gap; (2) China/Taiwan-target on nickel-added stainless steel, a nickel+chromium chokepoint-adjacent material; re-prices a China/TW->Japan stainless flow into a major downstream manufacturing base; (3) parallels the active 2025-26 Asian steel-AD wave the register is now capturing (Thailand DFT aluminium-extrusions, Indonesia KADI HRC, Malaysia MITI galvanised steel).
source ↗Chromium (structural component / core product) — Samancor's entire business is chrome ore mining and ferrochrome smelting; chromium is not an input it sources but the commodity it produces and sells. South Africa holds the large majority of the world's chrome ore reserves and ferrochrome smelting capacity, and chromium has no substitute in stainless steel or superalloy production — S…
A duty raises the cost of the origins the measure names into Japan's market — a cost line on affected flows, not lost availability. Origins outside the measure's named targets are the route around it; the text above names the targets where its source does.
chromium — you sit on the supply side: a measure tightening others' supply pushes buyers toward you, so your move is positioning, not substitution (chokepoint page).
TZ · stage awaiting-signature → high likelihood · touches silicon · flagged 28 Jun 2026, 101d pending
The same Finance Bill 2026/27 already tabled (Parliament-passed 23 June 2026, effective 1 July 2026) inserts a NEW export levy of "10% of the FOB value of the cargo OR TZS 200 per kilogram, whichever is higher" on exports of quartz minerals (HS 25. 06) and feldspar (HS 2529. 10. 00) via amendment to the Export Tax Act, Cap. 196 — a distinct beneficiation-forcing EXPORT-TAX instrument that pushes raw quartz/feldspar exporters toward in-country value-addition. 196), and neither existing entry mentions it; (2) material-relevant — quartz HS 25. 06 covers high-purity/silica quartz feeding the silicon→semiconductor/solar value chain, so a Tanzanian export tax re-prices a raw-silica supply node; the same "rocks to riches" beneficiation logic Tanzania applies elsewhere; (3) part of the wider African raw-mineral-export-tax wave (cf. Zimbabwe 10% lithium-concentrate levy, Namibia unprocessed-mineral ban, Guinea bauxite reference price).
source ↗Silicon (byproduct/secondary product line) — the TC Smelter (Mooinooi) also produces ferrosilicon, a silicon-rich alloy sold into steelmaking. This is a secondary product line alongside the core ferrochrome business, not a bulk input Samancor sources.
This changes the form of what TZ exports, not whether you can buy: raw/unprocessed exports are restricted while domestically processed material stays available — that is the measure's own mechanism. Your TZ-origin raw feed becomes processed-only; the route is a value-added purchase or a TZ processing partner, not a supplier switch.
silicon — you sit on the supply side: a measure tightening others' supply pushes buyers toward you, so your move is positioning, not substitution (chokepoint page).
EU · stage awaiting-signature → high likelihood · touches silicon · flagged 15 Jun 2026, 114d pending
Establishes the first legally binding "safe level" benchmark for EU strategic stocks of each of the 17 strategic raw materials listed in the CRMA Annex I; benchmarks used as reference by Member States, financial institutions, and industrial consumers to assess strategic supply risk; mandated every 2 years, so this is the first edition setting the baseline; informs CRMA Art. 23 monitoring obligations and is the evidential basis for Art. 24 corporate-reporting thresholds
source ↗Silicon (byproduct/secondary product line) — the TC Smelter (Mooinooi) also produces ferrosilicon, a silicon-rich alloy sold into steelmaking. This is a secondary product line alongside the core ferrochrome business, not a bulk input Samancor sources.
This is a reporting / disclosure obligation — it does not prohibit importing from anywhere, so there is no supplier to switch and we list none. What you must do is what the measure's own text above describes: map the supply chain it covers, run the audit, and file. Its text states no filing deadline — we don't invent one.
Mapping your supply chain is exactly the work this obligation requires — your MacroLens exposure report is that map's starting point.
VP Constantino Chiwenga announced at the Zimbabwe-China Business Forum (Hangzhou) that Zimbabwe will no longer issue new mining licences for operations that extract only one mineral from a deposit —…
Zimbabwean officials have signalled intent ("raw chrome exports obsolete") to expand the 25-Feb-2026 raw-mineral/lithium-concentrate export ban (filed) to cover chrome CONCENTRATE specifically — conc…
Second wave of CRMA Art.
1 of 29 filed an explicit in-force stage; the rest (flagged below) default from an absent stage: field, not a filed assertion. Each links to the register entry with its primary source.
For a material it buys, a restriction tightens supply and raises input cost — a headwind. For the 2 it produces, the same restriction supports pricing — a tailwind. Scores are footprint-adjusted and buyer-relative (0–100, higher = more exposed).
Its customers sit in ev batteries, permanent magnets, ev motors, wind turbines, defence… — read via the graph's critical minerals node, the nearest equivalent of its sector. A measure supporting those sectors supports demand for this company's products; one restricting them puts that demand at risk. The sign shown is the mechanical read — click through to judge whether a measure protects or constrains the customer.
Every tracked material is on the supply side — the strategy here is positioning, not substitution.
This company sits on the supply side of silicon. Restrictions by 🇨🇳 CN push buyers toward ex-CN producers — the strategy is to be visible where those buyers look: the silicon chokepoint page and the watchlist.
This company sits on the supply side of chromium. Restrictions by 🇨🇳 CN push buyers toward ex-CN producers — the strategy is to be visible where those buyers look: the chromium chokepoint page and the watchlist.
lib/policy-transmission.ts): an export prohibition in the measure's name/text → supply restriction; a raw/unprocessed-export limit or local-processing mandate → beneficiation (form change, not unavailability); reporting/disclosure/due-diligence language → compliance obligation; tariff/trade-remedy language → import cost; subsidy/fast-track/relaxation language → support; investment-screening/M&A language → investment control. When the text carries no signal we fall back to the action-type default and label the chip inferred; when neither exists the card says so and derives no response — we never assert a class the evidence doesn't support.lib/iptm-material-country-production.ts; mining stage preferred, refining as fallback — the stage and source year are in each figure's hover text). Ex-issuer supply removes the ISSUING country and renormalises the remaining listed shares (so they sum to 100% of what's left) — alternatives to the country making the rule, never a default ex-China list. Where the issuer holds no measurable share, the card says so plainly instead of implying supply loss.lib/alternative-viability.ts): each named alternative carries a deployment status — operating / ramping / restarting / development / unknown — derived from word-boundary signal phrases in its own dossier (“operating since 1896”, “restarting the … mine”, “FID taken”), and the verbatim matched phrase is shown as the basis so the claim is auditable; a dossier with no signal stays unknown, never guessed. Any evidenced production date is quoted verbatim (“first production targeted H2 2029” → “no tonnes before 2029”) — we never synthesize one. A measure whose own text claims extraterritorial / re-export / de-minimis / foreign-direct-product / percentage-of-value scope triggers the origin-switching warning above the list: such a rule follows the material, not the seller, so a foreign-made alternative can still be captured. Same-issuer register actions targeting an alternative's country and material mark it may be captured, with the entries linked. “Capacity partly committed” lines quote the dossier verbatim — we hold no structured free-capacity numbers and never imply a utilisation figure.How MacroLens tracks this for you. The policy register files new measures daily and this page recomputes from it — the same chokepoints are monitored live on the watchlist and in the full register.