President Trump reportedly “kicked out” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy from the White House today following a heated Oval Office exchange with J.D. Vance. Zelenskyy left the White House before the expected signing of what had been heralded as a landmark minerals agreement between the U.S. and Ukraine.

This is just as well. It was a lukewarm agreement anyways. One that didn’t give the United States any of the $500 billion in mineral stakes that Trump two weeks ago said he was looking for. Neither did it grant Ukraine any kind of U.S. security guarantees to keep Russia at bay.

Maybe it would have been something; a small deal on the path to a big deal (for peace). But that’s all in limbo now. Trump, in a social media statement this afternoon said Zelensky had disrespected the United States and its efforts in Ukraine and that “I have determined that President Zelenskyy is not ready for Peace if America is involved.”

Zelenskyy still appeared nonplussed by Trump’s initial suggestion two weeks ago that Ukraine should reimburse the United States for arming them against Russia by handing over $500 billion of mineral wealth. The idea raised alarms while Trump fixated on Ukraine’s bountiful reserves of “very good rare earth.” Early negotiations involved the idea of a fund, majority owned by the United States, into which Ukraine would transfer mineral rights and large royalty payments.

This elicited an uproar. Did Trump really want to loot Ukraine of the capital it needed to rebuild? What mining company would take the risk of building a new operation in a warzone only to hand over most of the profits to Uncle Sam? Experts noted that Ukraine doesn’t have many rare earths anyway (metals like neodynium, praseodymium and dysprosium, vital for magnets and electronics), although it does have deposits of titanium, lithium and graphite.

As it turned out, the rare earths was just a red herring. The agreement that the presidents were set to sign today was nothing like what Trump had initially advertised. According to the text, the U.S. would have gotten no mineral rights in Ukraine, and there was no stated mechanism to pay back American taxpayers a single dollar.

“It's not an American fund. It's a future economic development tool. To invest in Ukraine.”

Instead the agreement outlined terms for the creation of an Investment Fund, “for the benefit of Ukraine redevelopment.” This fund would have been overseen by the U.S. Treasury Department and Kiev; the Ukrainian government would submit to the fund 50% of “revenues” generated from all new extractive industries — minerals, oil, gas, coal, everything. The agreement states: “Contributions made to the Fund will be reinvested at least annually in Ukraine to promote the safety, security and prosperity of Ukraine.”

There is no mention of rare earths.

“It's not an American fund. It's a future economic development tool. To invest in Ukraine,” says Gracelin Baskaran at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “It’s very early stages with a lot of nuts and bolts,” she says, but the fund could be very important for Ukraine as a focal point in attracting international redevelopment capital. U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent met with Zelensky last week; his department would scrutinize every new oil, gas and mining deal in post-war Ukraine — the better to dissuade corruption.

Much of Ukraine’s mineral wealth remains undeveloped and would require large investments to exploit. Before they do that capitalists are eager for clarity on what constitutes the 50% of “revenues” to be paid to the fund. Ed Hirs, a lecturer in energy economics at the University of Houston, cautions against any new system that would impose a “confiscatory royalty” on digging new mines and drilling new wells. Hirs points out that when Michigan raised its severance tax on iron ore, miners just went to Canada. When Alberta upped its royalties on produced oil, drillers moved their rigs to North Dakota . Before Russia’s 2014 invasion Chevron and Shell were exploring Ukraine’s shale gas reserves but they aren’t going to start fracking unless it makes more financial sense than investing in Texas or Pennsylvania – and that 50% royalty makes that unlikely.

Plus Ukraine remains a war zone. There are plenty of safer places to develop critical minerals. As one veteran mining executive with projects in North and South America says, “It’s hard to make the best projects in the world work in the most stable environments” — let alone in Donetsk and Luhansk regions now under Russian control.

Of course, Trump doesn’t care if titanium and lithium are not rare earths. He probably doesn’t even care if any actual mining occurs as a result of the “very big” mineral deal, although he did attempt to coin a new phrase this week, “We'll be dig, dig, digging.”

What he does care about is big headlines showing him to be fighting for pay back for the American taxpayer. By that standard, this deal is already a massive success.

Because Trump also cares so much about squaring accounts, we likely have not heard the end of his Ukraine minerals quest. Days after the World Trade Center collapsed on 9/11 Trump told Forbes he wanted to build them back bigger than before. In the aftermath of President George W. Bush’s invasion of Iraq Trump said he should take their oil to pay for it (”I would take the oil. I would not leave Iraq and let Iran take the oil,” he said in 2016). He had the same instinct in 2017 when he discussed with Afghanistan’s then-president how to develop lithium resources there. Those are now being mined by Chinese companies.

Will Trump’s Ukraine mineral vision fade like the others? Or will he insist on a deal as a condition of backing Ukraine in peace? Exploiting natural resource wealth to rebuild the country is not a terrible idea. But considering the billions in upfront investment it would take over many years to generate cash returns to be put towards reconstruction — such negotiations are an exasperating precondition, but might be worth it. Trump’s not patient. But Ukraine really can’t afford to be.