Jamie Dimon Says America Fell Behind on Critical Minerals. JPMorgan Has Already Put $230 Billion Toward Catching Up

Jamie Dimon has been warning for a while that the U.S. let China build an economic edge while Washington moved too slowly, pointing specifically at how dependent American weapons manufacturing and technology industries have become on China for critical minerals. In his 2024 shareholder letter, he argued the U.S. "slept" while China built up those advantages, and he's been critical of how sluggish U.S. defense procurement has been in response.

Government policy has started to catch up with that warning. The Pentagon has budgeted $5 billion for fiscal 2026-2027 specifically to shore up supply chains for minerals like antimony, gallium, germanium, and aluminum, materials the Defense Department has flagged as in short supply for military equipment, while the Trump administration has signed or approved roughly $40 billion in critical-minerals deals since January 2025.

JPMorgan's own commitments dwarf even that. The bank is about a year into a 10-year, $1.5 trillion initiative aimed at critical minerals, defense, and frontier technology, and has already financed or facilitated roughly $230 billion toward it. Within that figure, it's about halfway through a $10 billion allocation set aside for defense startups, having deployed roughly $5 billion so far. Specific deals include a $75 million stake in a developer of an Idaho antimony mine, $1 billion in financing arranged for a rare-earth magnet manufacturing expansion, and a conditional $500 million commitment tied to rare-earth minerals in Brazil.

The bank has also backed companies building the hardware side of this shift directly: a $1.4 billion funding round for Hadrian, which runs automated factories for weapons components; $800 million for Castelion, which builds hypersonic missiles; and advisory work on a $1 billion Pentagon investment into L3Harris' missile business.

Dimon frames all of it as a deliberate strategy rather than a reaction to events. "Strong economies and national security don't happen by accident," he has said, tying JPMorgan's bet on critical minerals and defense manufacturing directly to the broader case he's been making for the U.S. needing to close the gap with China.