JP Morgan has appointed an executive to lead the company's critical mineral efforts under its $1.5 trillion drive to invest in industries deemed significant to US national economic security.
Andrew Frame will oversee the Security and Resilience Initiative's critical minerals strategy across extraction, refining and processing, a company representative confirmed to The National. Mr Frame's mandate will centre on addressing bottlenecks across the value chain for an industry considered essential to advanced manufacturing, energy and defence, they said.
Mr Frame's appointment was first reported by Mining.com.
JP Morgan launched its 10-year, $1.5 trillion Security and Resiliency Initiative last year. The drive spans four sectors – supply chain and advanced manufacturing, defence and aerospace, energy independence and resilience, and frontier and strategic technology. The bank said those are then divided into 27 subsections ranging from fishing to critical defence components.
Critical minerals fall under the supply chain and advanced manufacturing category, while battery storage and grid resilience fall under defence and aerospace. Artificial intelligence, cybersecurity and quantum computing make up the initiative's frontier strategies sector.
The $1.5 trillion builds on the previously announced $1 trillion the company planned to finance over the next decade. The commitment includes a separate $10 billion allocation for direct equity investments.
“It has become painfully clear that the United States has allowed itself to become too reliant on unreliable sources of critical minerals, products and manufacturing – all of which are essential for our national security,” JP Morgan chief executive Jamie Dimon said.
Mr Dimon told analysts during the company's third-quarter earnings call this week that the company “probably” deployed more than $200 billion in the first year.
Mr Frame's appointment makes him an integral part of the US critical minerals push amid a string of private and federal capital injection into the sector to strengthen the country's supply chain.
Since 2025, the US government has announced $10.8 billion in investments, including $5.1 billion in total private capital, in 14 critical minerals companies, using a range of tools from equity stakes to grants, loans and offtake agreements, according to the Council of Foreign Relations.
In September, Houston-based start-up Hertha Metals said it had closed a $133.65 million Series A round that includes a $65 million equity investment from the Pentagon. The company is planning on producing high-purity iron for rare-earth magnets needed for F-35 fighter jets and missile-guidance systems.
The US government also holds equity stakes in companies across the critical minerals supply chain including MP Materials, USA Rare Earth, and Canada-based Lithium Americas.
Also in September, Glencore and Mercuria became the first two companies to participate in VaultCo, a public-private partnership designed to implement the administration's Project Vault initiative. Glencore said its $500 million commitment from Export-Import Bank will allow it to create a critical minerals reserve in the US. Mercuria also announced a $500 million commitment, bringing the total pledge from the companies to $1 billion.
“Mineral security is national security. VaultCo is working to ensure the US industrial base has access to the critical minerals needed to build the products everyday Americans rely on and lead the world when they need it most,” ValtCo executive chair Brett Lambert said.