Billionaire businessman Andrew Forrest’s private mining group is in a debt dispute with rare earths hopeful Hastings Technology Metals, with the stoush threatening the future of the taxpayer-backed, ASX-listed junior.

At the centre of the dispute is a loan to Hastings from the company’s chairman, Charles Lew. Dr Forrest’s Wyloo Metals is bankrolling Hastings’ purchase of a European manufacturing plant and the development of a mine at Yangibana in Western Australia. Wyloo believes that the financing from Mr Lew’s company puts Hastings in breach of its own loan agreement.