Non-ferrous metals: lithium copper foil industry carding [institutional review]

SMM survey: what kind of metal do you like most in 2022?

Investment Summary:

Talk about it every Monday: carding the lithium copper foil industry

The use and classification of copper foil: copper foil is a kind of foil product made of high-purity copper by Calendering or electrochemical methods. According to the application field, it can be divided into standard copper foil and lithium copper foil; according to the different production process, it can be divided into Calendering copper foil and electrolytic copper foil.

Lithium copper foil is located in the middle of the industrial chain: the pricing method adopts "raw materials + processing fee", and the technical barrier enjoys the product premium. Copper foil enterprises are in the middle of the industrial chain, and affected by the consumption of upstream raw materials and downstream lithium batteries, the pricing method is usually the mode of raw material price + processing fee, which has the ability of cost transmission. The technical barrier of lithium copper foil is high, and the difficulty of production increases with the decrease of thickness. The thickness of copper foil directly affects the level of processing fees, so the enterprises in the forefront of extremely thin copper foil technology research and development will enjoy a higher product premium.

Extreme thinning is the future development direction: energy density and raw material cost are the driving force of extreme thinning. The energy density of power lithium battery is very high, and the thickness of lithium copper foil can indirectly affect the energy density of battery. Under the premise that other systems remain unchanged, the thinner the thickness of copper foil is, the thicker the slurry can be coated, and then the amount of active material will be increased, and the mileage of the car will be increased. The energy density of 8 μ m copper foil power battery is about 229 Whhand kg. If 6 μ m and 4.5 μ m copper foil are used, the energy density of lithium battery can be increased by 5% and 9%, respectively. At the same time, the thinner the thickness of copper foil is, the lower the amount of copper per unit area is, which is beneficial to the reduction of battery cost. At present, the unit copper consumption of 8 μ m copper foil lithium electricity is 800t / GWh, 6 μ m and 4.5 μ m copper foil unit electricity copper consumption can be reduced by 22.5% and 43.8%, respectively.

Investment strategy and key recommendations:

Precious metals: the price of precious metals in this period is on the strong side. This issue of the Federal Reserve announced the acceleration of Taper, at the same time, due to high inflation, the Federal Reserve decided to cut back on bond purchases by $30 billion a month, the US index rose and fell back, and the price of gold was supported.

Base metal:

Copper: fundamentals, supply-side disturbances remain, Minmetals LasBambas road closures continue, and transportation of key raw materials is restricted. MMG said copper production at its LasBambas mine in Peru was suspended on December 18. On the demand side, the Winter Olympic Games are approaching stricter environmental protection policies, and some enterprises in North China and Shandong and Henan may face production restrictions and stop production, superimposed on the domestic market to enter long single transactions at the end of the year, and the overall consumption in the lower reaches is sluggish. Domestic inventories are down 16.43% in the current period, and low inventories will support copper prices.

Aluminum: the price of aluminum is stronger this period. On the supply side, current energy and environmental policies are still the main disturbing factors. On the demand side, the downstream demand has improved. In terms of inventory, there is a state of accumulation at home and abroad. However, due to a certain gap in the supply side at present, aluminum prices fluctuate strongly in the short term.

New Energy Metals:

Cobalt: the price of electrolytic cobalt continues to rise in this period. O'Micron continues to wreak havoc, and supply-side disturbances remain. On the demand side, enterprises in Zhejiang were affected by the epidemic, which led to a decline in the operating rate of cobalt salt and stimulated the continuous rise of cobalt prices.

Nickel: the price of nickel continues to weaken in this period. We continue our previous judgment that with the climbing of MHP production capacity and the commissioning of Castle Peak high nickel matte, the supply of nickel sulfate raw materials has increased. On the demand side, the ternary precursor goes to the warehouse at the end of the year, the demand for nickel sulfate has declined, and the price of nickel niobate is under pressure.

Lithium: the prices of metal lithium and lithium salts continue to rise in the current period. On the supply side, the supply of lithium resources continues to be tight, the output of salt lakes in China's plateau areas is affected by seasonality, and some stocks in Tibet can not be transported smoothly. On the demand side, as of November 2021, the sales of new energy in China has exceeded 3 million vehicles, and the whole year is expected to exceed 3.4 million vehicles. Under the catalysis of downstream demand, it is expected that the lithium price in the follow-up market still has the potential to rise.

Market Review:

By the close of trading on Dec. 17, the non-ferrous metals sector was down 3.8%, outperforming 1.8pct and 2.9pct, respectively, relative to the CSI 300 index and the Shanghai Composite Index. The growth rate of non-ferrous metal plate ranked 27th among 28 plates in Shenyin Wanguo. The best performing sub-sector of the non-ferrous metal subplate this week was gold up 1.2%.

The top five stocks rose: Huafeng shares, Sanxiang New Materials, Sinosteel Tianyuan, Xin Platinum shares, Hunan Gold.

The top five stocks fell: China Mineral Resources, Jiayuan Technology, Oriental Tantalum Industry, Yitong New Materials, Shenzhen New Star.

Investment portfolio: Shengxin LiNeng Yiqiu Resources Tianqi Lithium Industry Huayou Cobalt Industry Ganfeng Lithium Industry 20% each.

Risk tips: epidemic resurgence; demand is lower than expected; policy risk.