SMM, 14 Dec: cobalt salt prices rose all the way with the rise in the price of cobalt metal from the second half of 2016 to the first quarter of 2017. Due to the limited threshold of technical barriers to cobalt salt production itself, under good terminal consumption expectations, Cobalt sulfate manufacturers sprang up to increase market supply in 2017, with an average start-up rate of more than 75% for the whole of 2017, with the exception of inadequate downstream consumption in the second quarter and environmental inspections in the third quarter. The production situation in 2018 is similar to that in 2017. The environmental protection inspection in the second quarter affected the production situation in Jiangsu, Jiangxi and Zhejiang. In addition, the price difference between internal and external cobalt prices was too large, and some smelters took the opportunity to stop production and reduce production, thus affecting market supply. However, production for the whole year is still showing a trend of substantial growth. SMM expects cobalt salt production to reach 62300 tons of metal tons in 2018, an increase of 12.3 percent over the same period last year, of which cobalt sulfate production will be 37300 tons, an increase of 26.4 percent over the same period last year. Cobalt chloride production was 25000 tons, down 4 per cent from a year earlier.

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