The import cost is more than 500,000 yuan/ton! The price of battery raw material cobalt doubles within the year!
The domestic cobalt price rose sharply this week, and the overall cobalt market fluctuated and rose.
As of December 7, the cobalt price was 465,100 yuan/ton, a sharp increase of 449,900 yuan/ton from December 1 at the beginning of the month, an increase of 3.38%; compared with the beginning of last week, the cobalt price was 44,1100 yuan/ton, an increase of 5.44%
Cobalt 102%
Since the beginning of the year, the price of metal cobalt in the international market has risen by 102% as of the end of November, and the price of raw materials has also risen by 86% during the same period.
Cobalt priced in US dollars has exceeded US$31 per pound, and the import cost of metal cobalt in RMB has exceeded 500,000 yuan per ton. The current domestic metal cobalt price is about 460,000 yuan.
Recently, affected by the Omi cron virus epidemic impact, 30 to 40% of cobalt raw material suppliers in South Africa have 1-2 months of delivery delays.
At present, the cobalt price has hit a new high since November 2018. Around April 2018, the cobalt price hit a 10-year high since 2008, exceeding 670,000 yuan/ton.
Whether it is 2018 or a new round of price increases, it will be greatly affected by the supply of cobalt in South Africa. It is understood that the Congo (DRC) cobalt resource reserves account for about 50% of the world, and the output accounts for about 70% of the world.
In October 2021, the import volume of cobalt wet smelting intermediate products was 19,132.343 tons, (the metal content is 30% grade, converted to 5,739.703 metal tons of cobalt), which fell 30.25% month-on-month and 44.45% year-on-year.
Among them, imports from Congo (DRC) accounted for 97.90%, imports from the Philippines accounted for 2.07%, and imports from Thailand reached 0.03%.
Raw materials are tightening and inventories have been low for a long time. Many institutions predict that cobalt prices may rise further.
Forward prediction
GT: The price of the cobalt sector is expected to pick up at the end of the year. The repeated epidemics in South Africa will have a greater impact on logistics and transportation. The tight supply of cobalt will continue for some time in the future.
Taking into account the strong demand in Europe and the United States, the cobalt inventory will continue to be consumed, and the upward trend of cobalt prices is determined.
YH: Due to the recent outbreak of Omi Kiron strain in South Africa, it has a significant impact on African logistics. Most of the main cobalt producing country, Congo, needs to be exported through South Africa.
The shortage of cobalt resources is expected to increase. At the same time, domestic new energy vehicles are booming, and production and sales have risen sharply. Support the growth of ternary battery production and sales, and the supply of cobalt raw materials is expected to tighten, and cobalt prices are expected to maintain an upward trend.
HT: South Africa mutant new coronavirus Omicron fermentation may affect the Congo (DRC)-South Africa-China global cobalt raw material supply chain, and the domestic cobalt raw material inventory tightness may continue until the first quarter of next year.
While the price of cobalt is rising, the demand for cobalt raw materials has increased due to the increase in new production capacity of some enterprises at the end of the year, and the impact of uncertain factors such as ocean shipping and the epidemic.
In the long run, if the Paris climate agreement goal is reached, by 2040, the global demand for cobalt will increase to at least 20 times what it is today.
Cui Dongshu, secretary-general of the Passenger Association, recently issued a statement that the restrictive factor in the development of new energy vehicles is the scarcity of cobalt resources, so there is the idea of developing lithium iron phosphate.
The development of new energy passenger vehicles in 2021 is mainly due to the huge amount of lithium iron phosphate batteries.
The increment, however, facing the high energy density trend of European and American new energy vehicles, especially the US electric pickup market is about to grow substantially.
Cui Dongshu believes that it is necessary to accelerate the loading of ternary lithium batteries to achieve full utilization of cobalt resources, turn cobalt ore stocks into on-board cobalt stocks, and implement policy guidance to achieve effective allocation of cobalt ore resources and improve the protection of nickel, cobalt and lithium resources.
