Critica Ltd has achieved gallium extraction of up to 91.9 per cent and scandium extraction of up to 84.7 per cent at its Jupiter rare earths project in Western Australia's Mid West region, according to SMH Business. The result adds potential by-product value to a project whose recent scoping study already shows an after-tax net present value of $2 billion, a figure that assigned zero value to either metal.
Jupiter's Hidden Value Unlocked
The testwork, conducted on drill sample composites representing Jupiter's typical iron-clay mineralisation, used acid baking followed by water leaching to pull gallium, scandium and rare earths into a single pregnant solution. The gallium figure marks a material improvement on the previously reported extraction rate of 63 per cent. Five of seven gallium tests cleared 84 per cent extraction, and four of the same seven samples delivered scandium extraction above 80 per cent.
For historical context on this cycle, see Bubblepedia's historical analysis of commodity supercycles.
Critica's 100 per cent-owned resource base is large by any measure. The 160 million tonne indicated resource hosts an estimated 6,400 tonnes of gallium oxide and 7,200 tonnes of scandium oxide. The company's 1.5 billion tonne inferred resource contains an estimated 60,000 54,000 tonnes of scandium oxide. Preliminary resin adsorption testwork has already shown co-loading of all three metal groups onto the resin, a step the company describes as a positive foundation for a workable separation route, though it cautions the current figures represent leaching into solution rather than final product recoveries.
Why Gallium and Scandium Are Now Strategic Assets
Gallium and scandium have moved from speciality metal status to supply-chain priority. China accounts for almost all global primary low-purity gallium production, and its recent export restrictions have rattled semiconductor, defence and advanced manufacturing supply chains. Canberra has responded by explicitly prioritising both metals as critical minerals exposed to disruption, and its $1.2 billion Critical Minerals Strategic Reserve is initially focused on antimony, gallium and rare earths.
"These results represent an important step in assessing the potential for additional value from Jupiter. Importantly, gallium and scandium are being extracted into solution alongside the rare earth elements, providing a basis for further investigation of two strategically important critical minerals used across advanced technologies, energy and defence." - Critica Limited chief executive officer Jacob Deysel
This is a scarcity story built on geography and processing bottlenecks, not monetary policy. It raises a genuine question for investors weighing store-of-value exposure: does a critical mineral deposit function as a hedge in the same way gold does, or is it a different animal entirely?
Gold's Different Kind of Scarcity
Gold trades at $4,103.55 per WealthWatchPro market data fetched 9 November 2026, up 1.04 per cent on the day. Silver sits at $52.73, up 1.52 per cent. Platinum is at $1,550.20, up 0.87 per cent, and palladium at $1,037.50, up 2.01 per cent. All four precious metals moved higher together, even as the VIX fell 9.01 per cent to 25.64, a level still elevated against calmer periods earlier in the year. The Shiller CAPE ratio sits at 38.91, a reading that continues to flag stretched US equity valuations.
Gold's scarcity is monetary and geological: finite above-ground stock, no counterparty risk, and a recognition that spans every central bank and currency regime. Gallium and scandium scarcity is industrial and geopolitical: concentrated production in one country, export policy as the binding constraint, and value tied to specific manufacturing applications rather than universal exchange. The two forms of scarcity are rallying together today, per WealthWatchPro market data, but they are not substitutes.
Background: Gold as the Default Hedge
Gold's role as the default portfolio hedge during periods of policy uncertainty and currency stress is well established. For readers unfamiliar with the mechanics, WealthWatchPro's guide to gold as a safe haven asset covers how gold has performed through past crises and why it behaves differently to industrial commodities. Investors weighing exposure across the metals complex, including platinum and palladium alongside gold and silver, can find a broader primer in our precious metals investing guide.
What This Means for Portfolios
A critical minerals explorer such as Critica offers equity exposure to a scarcity narrative, not a store of value in the gold sense. Share prices depend on execution risk, downstream processing capacity, and whether government reserve buying such as Canberra's $1.2 billion program translates into offtake. Gold requires none of that infrastructure to hold its function; it is liquid on exchanges worldwide and carries no project-specific risk. Readers building out a long-term allocation framework can compare gold against other stores of value in our analysis of gold versus Bitcoin as a store of value and our look at gold versus the S&P 500 over long run periods. Those seeking a deeper grounding in how to actually buy and hold the metal can start with our gold investing guide.
The Jupiter result does not change gold's monetary role. It does confirm that critical minerals are becoming a parallel scarcity trade, one driven by trade policy rather than interest rates, and investors should treat the two as separate exposures rather than interchangeable hedges.
Further reading
- Gold as a Safe Haven Asset
- Precious Metals Investing — Gold, Silver, Platinum and How to Buy Them
- Gold Investing
- Gold vs Bitcoin — Store of Value Comparison
- Gold vs S&P 500 — Long-Run Returns Compared
This is general information only and not financial advice.