Southeast Asia Lead Supply Tightens, Premiums Rise Due to Environmental Measures and Shipping Delays

[Lead Market Dynamics] On August 7, 2026, China Tower launched its 2026 nationwide centralized procurement tender for valve-regulated sealed lead-acid batteries, with a total procurement scale of 2,214.72 MWh. The tender covers three types of telecom batteries: 2V standard, 12V standard, and 12V front-terminal. The project will award contracts to up to four winning bidders and sets a maximum price per watt-hour. Only original manufacturers with cumulative sales revenue from valve-regulated sealed lead-acid battery products of at least 100 million yuan (tax inclusive) over the past three years are eligible to bid. The deadline for bid document submission is August 14. The lead-acid battery market for telecom backup power has ushered in an annual large-scale procurement opportunity.

On July 31, CMOC (603993.SH, 03993.HK) released a continuing connected transaction announcement, proposing to re-sign commodity purchase and sales framework agreements with CATL Group and its connected subsidiary, Hong Kong KFM Holding Limited (hereinafter referred to as "KFM"), respectively, and substantially raise the annual transaction caps for product purchases and sales, operational services, and interest on funds from 2026 to 2028. The supply chain ties between the copper and cobalt leader and the power battery leader were deepened further. The revision was driven not only by the expectations of a production surge from KFM's technological transformation and capacity expansion, but also by the impact of price fluctuations caused by the DRC's cobalt export quota policy, and involved t

The following table shows the ferrous and nonferrous metals movement on the SHFE and DCE on 10 Aug , 2026