Oregon's Massive Lithium Deposit Goes Public

US Elemental will list on Nasdaq via a $571M SPAC deal, consolidating major Oregon and Nevada lithium assets into a domestic public company

24 Apr 2026

Deep in the high desert of southeastern Oregon sits one of the world's largest known deposits of lithium, a metal that has become central to the ambitions of every government serious about electric vehicles. For years, the resource sat largely dormant, owned by an Australian mining firm better known to investors in Sydney than in Silicon Valley. That is about to change.

US Elemental, a newly formed company created to hold lithium assets in Oregon and Nevada previously owned by Australian-listed Jindalee Lithium, has agreed to merge with Constellation Acquisition Corp, a blank-cheque vehicle backed by Antarctica Capital, a New York investment manager overseeing more than $10bn in assets. The deal values the combined entity at $571m and, if completed in the second half of this year as expected, will list the company on Nasdaq under the ticker "ULIT."

The centrepiece is the McDermitt Lithium Project in Oregon, which holds a resource of roughly 21.5 million tonnes of lithium carbonate equivalent and a projected mine life of more than 60 years. A recent prefeasibility study pegged the project's net present value at $3.2bn, with planned annual output of around 47,500 metric tonnes of lithium carbonate over its first decade. A second asset in Nevada rounds out the portfolio.

The structure of the deal is revealing. Jindalee is expected to retain around 80% of the combined company after closing, with a capital raise of between $20m and $30m planned to fund further development. In other words, a largely foreign-owned resource is being repackaged as an American one, adorned with a domestic listing and an American ticker, to appeal to institutional investors and industrial partners who have been told to care very much about where their lithium comes from.

That pressure is real. Federal policy has pushed hard for domestic critical mineral supply chains, and McDermitt has been included in government transparency initiatives supporting strategic resource development. Battery manufacturers and carmakers seeking American-origin lithium need credible domestic suppliers.

Whether the merger delivers on its promise depends on factors beyond the deal itself: permitting timelines, capital markets appetite, and the patience of investors in a sector where the distance between a prefeasibility study and a producing mine is measured in decades, not months.