In a move with sweeping global ramifications, the DRC, responsible for more than 70 per cent of the world’s mined cobalt, has overhauled how it exports this critical mineral. In October 2025, the government replaced a month-long export ban with a stringent quota regime. This recalibration of supply has already rippled through international markets, reshaping pricing, supply chain expectations, and the calculus of battery metal dependency worldwide.
The export ban, imposed in February 2025 as cobalt prices hit a nine-year low near US $10/lb, was a blunt instrument aimed at stabilising a faltering market. Over time, however, Kinshasa opted for greater sophistication: a quota system combined with tight regulatory oversight, royalties and compliance checks. Under the new regime, the remainder of 2025 carries a quota of 18,125 metric tonnes; from 2026 onwards, annual exports are capped at 96,600 tonnes.
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Within this architecture, exporters must now contend with new demands: prior notification, batch sampling, quality certification, and payment of a 10 per cent royalty before any cargo may leave port. These strict conditions reflect the DRC government’s determination to reassert control over its cobalt legacy, a step many analysts interpret as a safeguard for long-term value rather than immediate volume.
Within this newly regulated system, Glencore has emerged as the first miner to resume cobalt exports under the quota regime. A small, initial shipment was cleared this December to test the procedures, marking a tentative, yet significant, return to global supply channels. Among the other major players, CMOC Group, which operates key cobalt mines in the DRC, secured the largest quota share for Q4 alongside Glencore. The state mineral regulator, ARECOMS, retains 10 per cent of the quota for strategic reserves.
Yet even as the first shipment sails, exporters and market watchers warn of lingering uncertainty. Compliance protocols and royalty payments have already posed challenges; some parties have appealed for urgent clarification to avoid disruptions to the broader battery material supply chain.
The impact of the pause-and quota on global supply has been dramatic. With the ban and restrictions effectively removing an estimated 160,000 to 170,000 tonnes from the market this year, cobalt, and especially forms used in electric vehicle (EV) battery manufacturing like cobalt hydroxide, has experienced a sharp rebound in price and demand pressure.
Cobalt hydroxide payables, a measure of the price of hydroxide relative to cobalt metal, have surged in China to parity with cobalt metal prices, at approximately US $24 per pound. This represents a dramatic reversal from the nadir of early 2025, when cobalt metal traded near US $10 per pound.
The rebound reflects more than just regulatory disruptions. With demand for EV batteries still robust in many markets, constrained supply from the DRC has translated into upward pressure on raw-material costs, a burden that may soon feed through to downstream manufacturing, consumer prices for electric vehicles, and broader clean energy supply chains.
Some analysts caution, however, that this tightness may not be easily or quickly resolved. Given the new compliance protocols and the time required for sampling, quality checks, and royalty clearance, sizeable shipments might not return until the first quarter of 2026, leaving the sector vulnerable to prolonged supply stress.
Supply Risk, EV Factories, and Strategic Minerals
For electric vehicle manufacturers and battery producers, the shift in Congo’s policy represents more than a regional adjustment; it signals a structural rebalancing of supply risk for one of the most critical raw materials in the green energy transition.
The DRC’s dominance, supplying more than 70 per cent of mined cobalt globally, out of roughly 280,000 metric tonnes per year, underscores how a single country’s regulatory decision can ripple across continents. For markets heavily dependent on Congolese cobalt, especially China, which refines much of the world’s cobalt intermediates, the quotas introduce a new axis of uncertainty.
The price surge for cobalt hydroxide may push battery manufacturers to seek alternatives: substituting with other battery chemistries, exploring supply diversification, or rethinking sourcing strategies. In that sense, Congo’s tightened grip may accelerate ongoing global shifts in battery design and mineral sourcing, moves already under way amid geopolitical considerations and supply-chain stress.
Moreover, the intervention may spur downstream investment in countries outside the DRC, from refining and processing capacities to alternative mineral sourcing, as firms seek to insulate themselves from policy volatility in a resource rich but politically complex region.
Control Over Quantity to Uphold Value
By replacing an open ended export ban with a controlled quota system, the DRC appears to be projecting a longer-term strategy: transforming cobalt from a commodity subject to volatile swings into a regulated strategic resource whose supply and pricing can be managed deliberately.
The necessity of pre-payment of royalty, lab certifications, compliance certificates and an obligation for quality checks before export are not merely bureaucratic layers. They are structural components of a nascent framework of resource stewardship. As the first shipment by Glencore demonstrates, the regime is operational, albeit cautiously.
If sustained, this policy could recalibrate global cobalt markets, potentially reducing the boom and bust cycles that have characterised the metal’s history. But it comes with risks. Overzealous regulation, unclear procedures, or excessive compliance burdens could discourage investment and drive producers away. For a country whose mining sector already contends with artisanal miners, environmental concerns, security challenges and governance pressures, balancing control and accessibility will be delicate.
When Supply Slips, the Future Trembles
The changes now unfolding in the DRC matter not just for one nation or one mineral; they matter for the trajectory of the global energy transition, for the future of electric vehicles, and for the architecture of strategic mineral supply chains worldwide.
Where once cobalt flowed relatively freely, now it is governed by quotas, regulatory oversight and strategic restraint. In the short term, this has pushed prices upward, created pressures on battery-material supply chains, and forced manufacturers to weigh alternatives. Over the medium to long term, it may prompt a reshaping of global value chains, tilting favour toward diversification, downstream processing outside Congo, and stronger control over supply dependencies.
For consumers in London, Beijing, Lagos or San Francisco, this may seem remote. Yet the battery under your EV, the cellphone in your hand, the devices powering the green transition, they may soon carry the imprint of Congo’s recalibrated cobalt strategy.
