#62 Sm

Samarium Price

Light Rare Earth Export Licence

Key component of SmCo permanent magnets.

Main trade forms: Oxide (Sm₂O₃)
Available from: CN, AU

Last update: 2026-04-04
6 records

Retail Reference

$3867/kg

Metal 99.5% · 8 g

Luciteria · US · 2026-04-04

Bulk Benchmark

No commodity benchmark available

Export Licence Chinese export licence required for Samarium in all controlled forms. Regulatory Tracker →

MOFCOM/GAC Announcement No. 18/2025 (effective 4 April 2025) controls all samarium forms — metal, oxide, alloys, compounds, and SmCo permanent magnets — under item 1C907 [2]. Controls apply to all countries on a case-by-case licensing basis.

China’s expanded October 2025 measures (Nos. 55–58, 61, 62) are suspended until 28 November 2026 [3], but the underlying No. 18/2025 controls remain fully in force throughout the suspension window.

Applications

Application	Role	Significance
SmCo permanent magnets	SmCo₅ and Sm₂Co₁₇ alloys	Operate to 350 °C; preferred for missile guidance, traveling-wave tubes, satellite actuators where NdFeB cannot survive [4]
Defence electronics	SmCo magnets in radar, EW, and precision-guided munitions	US DLA classifies SmCo as a critical defence material with no qualified substitute
Aerospace actuators	High-temperature servo motors, gimbal drives	Stable flux density and corrosion resistance vs. NdFeB
Optical filters	Sm-doped glass and CaF₂:Sm phosphors	UV-blocking optical components, IR luminescence
Catalysis	Sm(III) catalysts in organic synthesis	Niche pharmaceutical and fine-chemical use

Market & Supply

Global Sm₂O₃ production ~3,000 t/year (REO basis) [4]

China refined supply share ~85% [4]

Co-produced with Nd, Pr (bastnaesite/monazite)

SmCo magnet share of total Sm ~70% of demand

Export control MOFCOM/GAC No. 18/2025 [2]

Licence lead time ~4 months

Oxide bulk benchmark $3–$5/kg (FOB China)

Metal retail (small qty) $3,800–$10,000/kg

Verified Offers

All in-stock retail and bulk listings normalised to USD/kg. Sourced from primary surveys of eBay, Alibaba, and Western specialist retailers. The retail premium for hand-portioned metal samples is dramatic — the auto-rendered table below shows oxide bulk at single-digit dollars per kilogram while gram-scale metal trades above $9,000/kg.

Date	Form	Purity	USD/kg	Seller	Country
2026-03-15	Oxide	99.9% (3N)	$5	Stanford Advanced Materials	US
2026-03-15	Oxide	99.9% (3N)	$3	Edgetech Industries	CN
2026-03-15	Oxide	99.9% (3N)	$4	ALB Materials	CN
2026-04-04	Metal	99.9% (3N)	$9000	snaucke-elements (eBay)	NL
2026-04-04	Metal	99.95%	$10000	novaelements (eBay)	IT
2026-04-04	Metal	99.5%	$3867	Luciteria	US

Important Notes

Export controls in force Samarium is one of the seven medium and heavy rare earths controlled under MOFCOM/GAC Announcement No. 18/2025. SmCo magnet alloys and finished magnet rotors are explicitly named in the controlled item list [2].

SmCo > NdFeB at high temperature Samarium-cobalt magnets retain useful coercivity to 350 °C, well above NdFeB’s ~200 °C ceiling. This makes SmCo irreplaceable in missile guidance, satellite actuators, and high-temperature servo motors. There is no engineering substitute.

Co-production constraint Samarium is recovered as a by-product of Nd/Pr separation from bastnaesite. Supply cannot scale independently of light rare earth output, meaning Sm prices respond more to magnet-grade Nd demand than to Sm-specific demand.

Physical Properties [1]

Z: 62 · A_r: 150.36 u · ρ: 7.52 g/cm³ · T_m: 1,072 °C · T_b: 1,794 °C
Crystal: rhombohedral · Config: [Xe]4f⁶6s² · Ox. states: +2, +3

References

Wolfram Alpha, “Samarium element.” wolframalpha.com.
Ministry of Commerce / General Administration of Customs of the People’s Republic of China, Announcement No. 18 of 2025, “Export Control of Medium and Heavy Rare Earth Related Items,” 4 April 2025.
MOFCOM Announcements No. 70 and No. 72 of 2025 (suspension orders), 7–9 November 2025.
United States Geological Survey, Mineral Commodity Summaries 2025: Rare Earths, January 2025.