Chinese Lithium Carbonate Quotes Constantly Soaring Upwards

Singapore: In the last couple of months, the Lithium Carbonate market in China is consistently experiencing an average growth of 2-3% on a week-on-week basis. According to the ChemAnalyst pricing intelligence, the Lithium Carbonate market in China surpassed the USD 76000 per tonne mark in the second week of November 2022. Collective impact has been observed in both industrial and battery grades of Lithium Carbonate, with an increment of 3.22% and 2.59%, respectively. According to several market experts, the growth has been confined to Southern and Eastern regions.

The overall supply availability in the market is still facing tight spot availability of Lithium Carbonate as the market has faced severe difficulties in completing long-order deliveries. The ongoing epidemic situation in various parts of China hinders transportation availability piling the cumulative surge in the backlogs for domestic deliveries and the overseas market. As a ripple effect, the discussion in the domestic market has been impacted by the consistent clouded outlook of the spot market. In terms of demand, the offtakes soared domestically as operating rates at downstream manufacturing sites improved compared to the last month. The frequency of inquiries of downstream enterprises from overseas markets consistently rose amidst the prosperity of the new energy vehicle demand.

Although, due to the restricted market activities, the production output at the EV manufacturing sites has remained normal, and the demand side pressure has easily balanced out domestically. In response, the availability of raw material inventories was sufficient domestically, and the cost support to the downstream Lithium Hydroxide has remained stable with minimal changes.

According to the ChemAnalyst pricing intelligence, the Lithium Carbonate prices were likely to persist consistently upward as transportation issues will constantly hinder the availability over the domestic market. In addition, the cost support from feedstock spodumene concentrate has also gained globally over the diversification tally started by the overseas markets to counter the monopoly of Chinese supplies for Lithium Carbonate. In response, the availability remained consistent, and Lithium Carbonate's offers staggered upwards in the short term.