More from Joe Lowry;
As I said last time - I am not posting for awhile but I will share news.
I put this on Twitter earlier today. My last post indicated I believed the Big 3 will honor 2016 contracts and I still do but I can tell you it is the "official intention" of at least one of the major players to "charge what the market will bear" for any uncommitted 2016 volume with a price target for hydroxide in the mid teens. I expect the others will follow - why wouldn't they?
China has a larger share of global hydroxide capacity than carbonate capacity so the major impact in 2016 will be on the hydroxide market.
Tesla's supply chain could be paying $20/kg for hydroxide long before they get their dream price of less than $5/kg.
An extremely large gap between contract price and spot price will sweep across the lithium world in 2016. This is no longer a China story.
Absent a change in the supply scenario, the next few years are going to be very profitable for the lithium segments of ALB and SQM as well as the "Big 2" lithium companies in China.
Hopefully the new price paradigm will speed up investment........
Just remember: this wasn't really a post - it was a news item.
Joe Lowry One of the World's Leading Lithium Market Experts
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/really-post-its-news-item-joe-lowry?trk=v-feed