ICA divestiture order — three foreign investors in critical-mineral firms
Summary
Under the Investment Canada Act, Canada ordered three foreign investors to divest holdings in Canadian critical-mineral juniors (Sinomine from Power Metals, Chengze Lithium from Lithium Chile, Zangge Mining from Ultra Lithium). The official ISED statement describes the companies as engaged in the critical minerals sector, "including lithium," and does not state the investors' nationality. The cited Gowling WLG analysis (secondary) identifies the three as Chinese firms, places the orders days after a 28 October 2022 policy making SOE investment in critical minerals approvable only "on an exceptional basis," and notes that Power Metals' exploration projects are for lithium, cesium and tantalum. Lithium is now tracked in the material set; cesium and tantalum remain outside it.
Analytical significance
A leading allied use of investment screening (rather than export control) as a critical-minerals instrument, tied to friend-shoring rhetoric and timed alongside US engagement.
Instruments in this event
The separate financial commitments and control clauses this announcement contains, each with its own status history and evidence.
Control clauses (3)
Investment divestiture
In forceICA divestiture order — three foreign investors in critical-mineral firms
Investment divestiture
In forceICA divestiture order — three foreign investors in critical-mineral firms
Investment divestiture
In forceICA divestiture order — three foreign investors in critical-mineral firms
Framing anchors
Official framing, classified only from quoted passages.
rigorous scrutiny by Canada's national security and intelligence community
From the ISED divestiture statement, describing the Investment Canada Act national-security review applied to the three investments.
Affected materials
Related events
Events touching the same materials.
Sources (2)
Government of Canada orders the divestiture of investments by foreign companies in Canadian critical minerals companies
Primary sourceInnovation, Science and Economic Development Canada
ISED statement ordering the three divestitures under the Investment Canada Act. URL filed under the canada.ca 2022/10 path; the order date is 2 November 2022.
https://www.canada.ca/en/innovation-science-economic-development/news/2022/10/government-of-canada-orders-the-divestiture-of-investments-by-foreign-companies-in-canadian-critical-mineral-companies.html
Canada restricts future investments in critical minerals by state-owned enterprises
Secondary analysisGowling WLG
Law-firm analysis of the SOE policy and the divestiture orders.
https://gowlingwlg.com/en/insights-resources/articles/2022/canada-restricts-future-investments
Citation
Cite this record
This cites the record — the project's coding of the instrument. For a claim about what a government actually did, cite the primary document itself; the sources above carry the canonical URLs.
Strategic Materials Policy Tracker. "ICA divestiture order — three foreign investors in critical-mineral firms." Record evt-ca-ica-divest-2022, 2022-11-02. https://strategic-materials-policy-tracker.vercel.app/events/evt-ca-ica-divest-2022