American Rare Earths’ (ASX:ARR) announcement on Tuesday was the second-most watched by HotCopper users ahead of trade – and the second announcement on the ASX to involve the USA’s export-import bank (EXIM.)

On Tuesday, EXIM issued American Rare Earths a non-binding Letter of Interest (LOI) to the tune of US$456M (A$667M) – in other words, a sign the bank is taking a meaningful look at ARR’s project.

That project is its Halleck Creek rare earth element (REE) play in Wyoming, “The Cowboy State” – where drilling kicked off back in July and where ARR recently transferred the project to a US subsidiary.

(Fun fact: ARR also trades on the US OTCQX markets.)

All in all, the bank is considering offering a repayable loan of US$456M to American Rare Earths to allow it to construct and execute its Cowboy State Mine area at the Halleck Creek Project.

The calculus here is likely well-understood by all who keep up to date with mineral explorers – the US needs rare earths in a world where competition with China is becoming increasingly fierce.

“The Halleck Creek deposit has the potential to be a multi-generational rare earths asset for the US,” the company wrote on Tuesday.

“The deposit has a 2.34 billion tonne JORC resource, containing 7.48 million tonnes of total rare earth oxides, including key magnet metals like Neodymium (Nd) and Praseodymium (Pr) oxides.”

HotCopper users were net bullish on the news on Tuesday in the announcement thread.

“This company is getting the respect it deserves, the government is taking notice and will be looking to get this up and running,” user cerneka wrote.

EXIM’s overall mandate is to secure US jobs in a variety of industries (that have import-export implications,) and, allow US companies to compete with foreign counterparts.

Tuesday’s LOI to ARR is the second such correspondence of its type detectable as far as ASX newsflow goes – unrelated lithium exploration company Anson Resources, also listed down under, received an LOI on Tuesday, too.

ARR last traded at 25.5.cps.

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