COMPUTE: Inside China’s Control of the Critical Metals Supply Chain w/ Craig Tindale
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COMPUTE: Inside China’s Control of the Critical Metals Supply Chain w/ Craig Tindale

1:06:46 Jan 20, 2026
About this episode
Welcome back to The Blockspace Podcast! Today, Craig Tindale, macro investor and former manufacturing consultant, joins us to talk about the critical mineral shortage and multi-trillion dollar problem facing the US data center, energy, and defense sectors. We dive into his "Critical Mineral Thesis," exploring how China secured 80-90% of the world's critical mineral refining capacity. Craig explains the "midstream matrix," the looming 25,000-tonne silver deficit, and why the US is like a "turtle on its back" after decades of outsourcing. We discuss if sound money can save a system that has lost its atomic backbone. Subscribe to the Blockspace newsletter! If you’d like to read Craig Tindale’s work to learn more, you can find his seminal articles here: -?Critical Materials: A Strategic Analysis? -?The Hard Bifurcation? Notes: * China controls 80-90% of mineral refining. * 70% of silver production refined in China. * 25,000-tonne silver deficit in four years. * Large transformers have 4-5 year wait times. * Chinese firms borrow at 2-4% interest. Timestamps: 00:00 Start 02:37 Who is Craig? 10:15 Thesis 13:49 Silver problems 17:41 Tin 19:50 Titanium 22:42 Recession game theory 27:32 Sound money standard 33:43 Regulation outlook 40:24 Reshoring industry 45:22 Data center demand 49:39 Energy generation stagnation 54:52 Waking up to reality 1:00:52 Greenland & political games ?CleanSpark, America's Bitcoin Miner! CleanSpark (Nasdaq: CLSK) is a market-leading data center developer with a proven track record of success. We own a portfolio of power, land, and data centers across the United States powered by globally competitive energy prices. Sitting at the intersection of Bitcoin, energy, operational excellence and capital stewardship, we optimize our infrastructure to deliver superior returns to our shareholders. Monetizing low-cost, high reliability energy by producing a global emerging critical resource – compute – positions us to prosper in an ever-changing world. ? FBOX, Cooling for Bitcoin Mining and the AI Data Center Transformation FBOX is the global leader in cooling system manufacturing, with the #1 shipment volume of bitcoin mining containers worldwide. Not only powering for the strongest hashrate, their technology also helps mining infrastructure transform into AI data centers. Backed by
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