On January 12, the website of Wuxi stainless steel electronic trading center showed that the prices of various lithium carbonate futures fell by more than 11.71%, and the lithium price index fell by 11.77%. This is also the second consecutive day that the lithium price index of the website plummeted, and its lithium price index fell more than 10.5% the previous day.
While the "flash collapse" was staged, on the other side, the spot quotation of lithium carbonate continued to rise, showing a very different trend.
On January 12, according to Shanghai Ganglian E-Commerce Holdings Co.Ltd(300226) data, the quotation of some lithium battery materials rose again. Among them, lithium carbonate increased by 10500 yuan / ton, and the average price exceeded 330000 yuan / ton.
In this regard, the reporter of Kechuang board daily learned from the website of Wuxi stainless steel electronic trading center that Wuxi stainless steel electronic trading center is a trading market supervised by a third party that introduced funds in October 2006. Industrial and commercial information shows that the company was established on October 25, 2006, and its legal representative is Yu Xiaochun.
In view of the above situation, Shanghai Ganglian E-Commerce Holdings Co.Ltd(300226) Qu Yinfei, a lithium analyst of the new energy business unit, told the SciDev board daily that " Shanghai Ganglian E-Commerce Holdings Co.Ltd(300226) evaluates the price of the spot market. The price of Wuxi stainless steel mesh belongs to the price of spot forward trading, and the electronic disk price is very vulnerable to changes caused by capital inflow and outflow. "
" Wuxi stainless steel belongs to the spot forward trading platform. This change is mainly due to the capital flow of the trading platform caused by market rumors. " Qu Yinfei said.
A senior futures analyst told scidev.net daily that Wuxi stainless steel electronic trading center is a spot forward trading platform. "The quotation of each website is different, but the data of Wuxi is relatively low. It's hard to say whether it has control. The specific reason is not known." the analyst said.
the subsequent spot quotation of lithium carbonate may continue to rise
According to the spot price of non-ferrous metals in Shanghai, on January 12, the price of 99.5% battery grade lithium carbonate was 316000 yuan / ton, an increase of 3000 yuan compared with the previous day.
At present, lithium carbonate, as an important raw material for power batteries of new energy vehicles, is mainly used to produce lithium iron phosphate and low and medium nickel cathode materials in ternary materials.
According to the data monitoring of business agency, lithium carbonate products rose sharply in 2021, and the prices of the whole year were in the upward range. among them, on December 31, 2021, the average price of industrial grade lithium carbonate in East China was 266000 yuan / ton, an increase of 432% compared with the price at the beginning of 2021; On December 31, 2021, the average price of battery grade lithium carbonate in East China was 282000 yuan / ton, an increase of 416.48% compared with the beginning of 2021.
In this regard, the lithium carbonate analyst of business agency told the reporter of science and Innovation Board daily, "As the Spring Festival holiday approaches, the logistics will enter the shutdown state around the middle of January. Therefore, the centralized procurement of lithium carbonate may occur in the first ten days of January, the logistics and transportation costs may also rise, and the price of lithium carbonate will still be in the upward trend; after the Spring Festival holiday, the market opening rate will recover, and the demand will still enter the upward trend again, Under the expectation of the rapid expansion of the global lithium battery industry, the lithium carbonate gap in the world and China may be further enlarged. It is expected that the price of lithium carbonate may continue to rise in the first quarter of 2022. ”
Qu Yinfei, a lithium analyst at the new energy business department, told the science and Innovation Board daily, " the price of lithium carbonate in the later stage still has upward mobility. The global increment in 2022 is expected to be 163000 tons (LCE), with a supply growth rate of about 24%, but the demand growth rate is nearly 40%. In 2022, faced with lower opening inventory, the supply is still insufficient and it is difficult to meet the rapidly growing demand. "
" lithium carbonate will continue to rise due to tight supply and demand in the later stage. " Huaan Securities Co.Ltd(600909) told the reporter of science and Innovation Board daily.
In addition, Guosen Securities Co.Ltd(002736) research shows that the prosperity of the lithium industry continues to improve. It is expected that in early 2022, the tight supply and demand of global lithium mines will be difficult to be alleviated in the short term, and there is still room for further upward prices of lithium salts and lithium mines.
the contradiction between supply and demand of lithium resources still exists
From the perspective of the whole lithium industry chain, the most upstream is lithium ore, which is then processed into lithium salt products such as lithium carbonate and lithium hydroxide, and then to deeply processed lithium products such as battery grade lithium carbonate and battery grade metal lithium. After integrated supply by downstream battery manufacturers, it is finally applied in new energy vehicles and other fields.
According to the research of Shengang securities, at present, the concentration of lithium resource supply side is high, and the constraints of lithium supply are still. With resource advantages, Australian mines and South American salt lakes have always been the main suppliers in the world, supplying nearly 80% of raw materials. From 2021 to 2023, there will still be stage mismatches in lithium salt, and the price of lithium salt will remain high. after 2023, with the baptism of power battery recycling tide and the maturity of superimposed recycling process, it is expected that the global lithium supply-demand relationship will improve from 2024 to 2025.
At present, the chain reaction caused by the price rise of raw materials upstream of lithium batteries has been transmitted to other links of the industrial chain, such as battery manufacturers.
In the third quarter of 2021, most global power battery manufacturers were under pressure from the continuous rise in the prices of raw materials from the middle and upper reaches. Among them, except that Contemporary Amperex Technology Co.Limited(300750) achieved double increases in revenue, net profit and month on month, and the gross profit margin increased slightly, the revenue, profit and gross profit margin of LG new energy, Panasonic, Eve Energy Co.Ltd(300014) , Gotion High-Tech Co.Ltd(002074) and other power battery manufacturers decreased to varying degrees.
Tianfeng Securities Co.Ltd(601162) research shows that if the impact of bargaining power and procurement volume on the actual procurement cost is combined with the hedging of performance and technological progress and cost rise, in general, the cost increase transmitted from the rise of raw material price to the power battery end is about 20% - 25%.
In addition, according to the calculation of GGII (advanced lithium battery), affected by the rise in the price of raw materials, the theoretical cost of cell and battery system has increased by more than 30%, and the pressure of battery enterprises has increased sharply. in order to ensure long-term and stable product delivery and cost control, many battery enterprises can only choose to invest upstream and participate in the layout of raw material industry.
" the contradiction between supply and demand supports the central high of lithium price and does not affect downstream demand. " Huaan Securities Co.Ltd(600909) research shows that, " for vehicle manufacturers, resources tend to be new energy vehicles, and models and market layout have higher priority. The rise of single link cost does not affect model launch and overall market demand, and there is still a price buffer for some lithium battery midstream links and auto parts. "
On January 12, according to the statistical analysis of China Automobile Industry Association, automobile production and sales showed year-on-year growth in 2021, ending the decline for three consecutive years since 2018. Among them, new energy vehicles became the biggest bright spot, with annual sales of more than 3.5 million vehicles and market share increased to 13.4%, further indicating that the new energy vehicle market has shifted from policy driven to market driven.
In addition, on January 11, the passenger Federation said that according to the newly released policy, the framework and threshold requirements of the current purchase subsidy technical index system will remain unchanged in 2022, and the subsidy scale is not locked from the original expected upper limit of 2 million vehicles, which will realize the subsidy throughout the whole year of 2022. with the doubling of the scale of the new energy industry chain and the improvement of cost reduction ability, it is expected that the increment of new energy vehicles will be strong by the end of 2022. it was originally expected that the sales volume of new energy passenger vehicles would be 4.8 million in 2022. At present, it should be adjusted to more than 5.5 million, and the penetration rate of new energy passenger vehicles would reach about 25%.
Mystery of lithium carbonate "futures" flash collapse in China's lithium salt quotation system
What happened to the collective collapse of crazy lithium carbonate price? The price just hit a record high and the situation reversed overnight?
