Proportion of 5G phones in China's mobile phone shipments may exceed 85% in 2021

SHANGHAI, Jan 18 (SMM) – In November 2020, domestic mobile phone shipments reached a small peak for the second half of the year. In 2020, 5G mobile phone shipments totalled 162.77 million units, accounting for 52.9% of the total domestic mobile phone shipments.

In 2020, China's LCO output totalled 75,000 mt, a year-on-year increase of 22%. In 2020, LCO demand from China's lithium battery industry rose 16.9% year-on-year. This was mainly driven by increasing demand for office supplies and entertainment products at home amid COVID-19 and increased 5G mobile phone shipments.

On the other hand, output of tricobalt tetraoxide in China was 7,055 mt in December 2020, an increase of 1.4% month-on-month and 41.2% year-on-year. Downstream stockpiling ahead of Chinese New Year (CNY) drove tricobalt tetraoxide producers to increase production in December. However, some producers reduced operating rates in January due to shortage of raw materials. Tricobalt tetraoxide production is estimated at 7,000 mt in January, a decrease of 1.4% from the previous month and an increase of 65.2% from the same period last year.

5G mobile phones likely to account for nearly 70% of China's total mobile phone shipments in Jan

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