According to The New York Times, supply is finally beginning to catch up with demand in the rare earth element market.
A few months ago, I posted about the Chinese government’s export restrictions on rare earth elements. The bad news for the lighting industry was that China’s nationwide production cap was causing the price of fluorescent light bulbs to rapidly increase. (Rare earth elements are a crucial component to the process of creating a fluorescent light bulb).
However, it seems that international prices for rare earth elements have fallen since August and are continuing to decline! The timeline for the impact on the lighting industry is unclear at this point. For more information, read this article.