[2020.07.27 Morning meeting Summary of Cobalt Lithium New Energy] Cobalt salt price may continue to rise and the upward space for lithium salt price narrows.

Published: Jul 27, 2020 10:02

SMM, July 27th:

Battery terminal market:

In terms of power market, cooperation between foreign car companies and domestic battery manufacturers has been strengthened, such as Volkswagen and Wanxiang Group, Yiwei LiNeng and brilliance BMW, Daimler and Funeng, Ningde Times and Honda, Xinwanda and Renault Nissan, and so on. Recently, the European car market has been repaired rapidly, and the electric car market has great potential, but cooperation with battery factories will basically begin after September this year or next year, so it will take time to have an impact on the domestic new energy industry chain. In addition, there was no obvious increase in domestic terminal market demand in August, and the recovery rate of the whole market was slow.

Price of upstream raw materials:

Cobalt: cobalt raw material suppliers hesitate to sell, and the price goes up. The cost of the smelter has risen further, and the price of cobalt salt may be further raised this week. Cobalt sulfate last week transaction price of more than 46000 yuan / ton, downstream demand for ternary precursor feedback, cobalt sulfate inventory has been prepared to August-September, downstream demand only slightly increased, cobalt sulfate price increase or only make up for the cost increase.

Lithium: the price increase of industrial-grade lithium carbonate increases the cost of purification enterprises, and its purchasing demand weakens; in June, the import of lithium carbonate increased significantly, which put significant pressure on domestic supply, the output of stacked carbon increased, the shortage of subsequent shipments eased, and the upward space for lithium salt prices narrowed.

Cathode materials and precursors: in terms of ternary precursors, the increase in cobalt salts last week was gradually transmitted to the precursor enterprises. at present, the price of dynamic precursors basically increased by 1000-2000 yuan / ton, due to no obvious increase in downstream demand. the price increase of the precursor is lower than that of cobalt sulfate. Sanyuan material enterprises are still playing a game with battery factories, and the current price has only increased slightly, and it is expected that a specific increase will be reflected after a large number of transactions at the end of this week. In terms of lithium manganate, overseas market demand recovers slowly, domestic orders are basically stable, a small increase in the price of working carbon is difficult to transmit to lithium manganate enterprises, and the price remains basically unchanged in the near future.

Nickel: the price of nickel sulfate remained stable last week, and the actual transaction price of battery-grade nickel sulfate in the market was 23500-23800 yuan / ton. the prices of ternary precursors and cathode materials, which had been low for a long time, began to increase with the price of nickel sulfate and cobalt sulfate. This week began for two consecutive weeks for nickel sulfate downstream monthly routine procurement node, the recent nickel sulfate price may rise slightly, the market transaction price is expected to be about 24000 yuan / ton.

News:

1. [Tesla's German factory can produce up to 2 million vehicles a year or start production next year] it is reported that Tesla and his car manufacturing targets in Europe are surprisingly optimistic. The Berlin superfactory can produce up to 2 million vehicles a year, according to sources familiar with the electric carmaker's plans. It is worth mentioning that this is more than twice the output of Volkswagen's Wolfsburg plant, one of the largest production plants in the automotive industry. According to reports, Tesla expects the European electric car market to reach about 12 million vehicles.

2. [Ningde Times will sell car batteries in Europe] Ningde Times recently signed an European-wide partnership agreement with German battery system manufacturer HOPPECKE. Under the agreement, HOPPECKE will test, repair and replace lithium-ion batteries installed in electric vehicles on behalf of CATL, with an initial focus on vans and buses.

3. [Fujian issued an action plan for promoting 560000 new energy vehicles from 2020 to 2022] recently, 11 departments, including the Fujian Department of Industry and Information Technology and the National Development and Reform Commission, jointly issued a circular on "further accelerating the promotion and application of new energy vehicles and the high-quality development of the industry to promote the construction of" Electric Fujian "three-year Action Plan (2020-2022). The notice clearly will focus on cultivating and building industrial clusters of new energy vehicles, energy storage batteries and new energy equipment, and expand and extend the industrial chain. By 2022, the output value of the whole industry chain will exceed 280 billion yuan. By 2022, a total of 560000 new energy vehicles will be popularized and applied in the province, doubling on the basis of the cumulative promotion and application in 2019. All the new and updated buses in the province adopt new energy vehicles; the new and updated highway passenger transport lines suitable for the application of new energy vehicles all adopt new energy vehicles; the new and updated urban parade taxis and net-booked taxis in the province all adopt new energy vehicles in principle, and accelerate the adoption of new energy vehicles in time-sharing rental vehicles. The new and updated sanitation and postal logistics vehicles in the central urban area all adopt new energy vehicles in principle.

SMM battery materials research team

Qin Jingjing 021-51666828

Mei Wangqin 021-51666759

Huo Yuan 021-51666898

Data Source Statement: Except for publicly available information, all other data are processed by SMM based on publicly available information, market communication, and relying on SMM‘s internal database model. They are for reference only and do not constitute decision-making recommendations.

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[2020.07.27 Morning meeting Summary of Cobalt Lithium New Energy] Cobalt salt price may continue to rise and the upward space for lithium salt price narrows. - Shanghai Metals Market (SMM)