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Ok friends – oil isn’t the only commodity undergoing a structural supply crunch right now. You might have heard that in addition to crude and LNG, helium is going bananas. That’s because one of the main supplies of it is as a byproduct of natural gas extraction. The funny thing about helium is that it can rise into the upper atmosphere and be converted to He^(+) (an alpha particle). Those alpha particles then get ejected by the magnetic field. There is not enough in the atmosphere to concentrate it. The only source is subsurface. Or fusion.
Qatar, and the Ras Laffan plant to be exact, produces around a third of the global supply of helium. It has experienced “extensive damage” and will be offline for months (maybe years). The US is the leading supplier of helium. Supply is inelastic. It will take months to years to bring more online. There are only a handful of vessels that can transport it – and they’re trapped in the gulf behind a wall of Shahed drones. After six weeks, the helium in their tanks will boil off, and they will have to vent it. It will be gone. Ras Laffan isn’t coming back online soon (some estimates are 5 years before meaningful production). The Qataris already declared force majeure (basically saying “we can’t deliver it”).
Helium does not trade with a spot price. Everything is contracted. That makes the market opaque. The price has more than doubled since 2018. Why? Because helium is required for advanced chip manufacturing. Every indication is that the price is on the move right now. Every week that the disruption lasts is another leg up. It is priced in millions of cubic feet. It’s around $500/mcf right now. The target if the conflict continues is >$1000/mcf.
Korea has enough to make it to June. Taiwan says it has sufficient reserves for now. Both get their gas from Qatar. Already, Air Liquide is telling people they will not be able to meet their delivery obligations. It should be obvious that we are entering an interesting phase with this commodity.
That phase is defined by one key: demand is also inelastic. Hospitals use around a third for MRI machines and other tech. A quarter is used for semiconductor manufacturing. Technical diving and some welding processes (\~15%) aren’t possible without it. NASA spent $1m on helium for Artemis 2. None of the people buying helium for those applications cares if the price doubles. There is no ready alternative. The solutions are more production (not feasible on a short time frame, unless…), restarting Qatari production (3-5 years away, regardless of conflict resolution), or demand destruction (most likely outcome).
Supply crunch meets inelastic demand. How to play this? There aren’t many true, pure-helium plays. Desert Mountain Energy (DMEHF) and Avanti Helium (ARGYF) are penny stocks with exposure to helium. US Energy (USEG) plans to bring some production online later this year. Linde (LIN) supplies quite a bit to Europe. You could also go with a big natural gas producer – but that dilutes helium exposure.
For this play, I like Pulsar Helium (PSHRF). Their flagship Topaz Project in Minnesota has yielded some of the highest helium concentrations ever recorded globally (up to 14.5%), well above the industry’s commercial threshold of 0.3%. They are a pre-revenue, exploration play and one of the few sources of Helium-3. Their production is domestic. Except for some exploration in Greenland – which might also be domestic?
Until recently, the US had a massive strategic reserve (we did away with it because… reasons). We even classified helium as a critical mineral. My thesis is that we will return to that status. The CEO of Pulsar has been meeting with Pentagon officials to discuss the critical shortage. We might be looking at an MP Materials event where they name a private-sector partner and award a grant. My investment is based on the possibility that Pulsar will be named the partner. They will accelerate towards production this year. That, plus the soaring price of helium, would be something to behold.
The bear cases are simple: a ton of demand destruction leads to a collapse in price, Pulsar gets beaten out by someone else as the chosen one, they announce they can’t get production online anytime soon, or the market lights itself on fire and risk-on plays explode.
I don’t have a price target here. There are no options. I prefer Pulsar because it’s big enough and liquid enough compared with the smaller, pure-helium plays (e.g., DME). I know that it’s already up >200% over the last couple of months. I don’t really care. This is just getting started. Shares to short hit 0 today, and CTB is going up. The price jumped 20% today as this is sinking in. I’m already in \~20k shares (aka, options that never expire). Adding more tomorrow. Call me bubble boy. Not financial advice. Play at your own risk.
Take a minute and watch the president of Pulsar, newly appointed Cliff Cain, on Bloomberg. He was brought on this week with the expressed goal of government engagement and accelerating production. He’s definitely selling something, and I am definitely buying: [https://www.bloomberg.com/news/videos/2026-04-04/global-helium-shortage-threatens-tech-sectors-video](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/videos/2026-04-04/global-helium-shortage-threatens-tech-sectors-video)