{"id":952570,"date":"2018-08-24T12:00:02","date_gmt":"2018-08-24T12:00:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/?p=952570"},"modified":"2018-08-24T12:00:02","modified_gmt":"2018-08-24T12:00:02","slug":"chiles-lithium-giant-sqm-sees-prices-falling-further-this-year-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/?p=952570","title":{"rendered":"Chile\u2019s lithium giant SQM sees prices falling further this year"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Cecilia Jamasmie<\/a><\/span> <\/p>\n

\"Chile's<\/a><\/div>\n

Chilean lithium miner SQM confirmed Friday<\/a> it expects realized lithium prices to be lower in the second half of 2018 partly as a result of new supply ramping in Australia and the company’s own predicted increase in sales, even though global demand is forecast to grow more than 20% this year.<\/p>\n

Delivering results for the three months to June 30<\/a>, the $12.8-billion Santiago-based company posted a $247.7-million revenue, which represents a 21.2% jump when compared to the same period of 2017.<\/p>\n

Total revenue from SQM’s five businesses increased by 13% to $1.15 billion, from $1.02 billion in the corresponding months last year, thanks mainly to the company’s lithium unit.<\/p>\n

Price commentary unlikely to deter a very bearish sentiment on lithium-heavy names, say analysts.<\/q><\/p>\n

Despite expecting softer prices in the months to come, the company said they will remain higher than the average reached last year.<\/p>\n

Sector analysts, including BMO’s Joel Jackson, agreed SQM’s lithium price commentary was unlikely to deter a very bearish sentiment on lithium-heavy names.<\/p>\n

The company, in fact, expects lithium sales volumes to be almost 50% higher in the second half of the year, compared to the first half, bringing total sales volumes to over 50k tonnes during 2018.<\/p>\n

To meet company expectation, however, at least 60% of volume needs to come in second half versus a normal skew of 52-54, BMO’s Jackson said in a note to investors.<\/p>\n

While sales for the key ingredient in electric vehicle batteries were down 3% in the second quarter compared to last year, SQM achieved higher average prices in the second quarter \u2014 $16,568 per tonne. The figure represents a 26% increase over the $16,400 per tonne obtained in the first quarter of 2018.<\/p>\n

Aggressive expansion plans<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Chile, which holds the largest known lithium reserves in the world (about 52%), recently lost its top lithium producer crown to Australia<\/a>. But SQM is working hard on reversing that.<\/p>\n

Over the past several months, the world’s number two lithium producer has been expanding its mines. The company recently finished the first stage of a lithium carbonate ramp-up in Chile’s Salar del Carmen, reaching a capacity of 70k million tonnes a year.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur next step will be to work towards our goal of 120k MT\/year, which is expected to be completed by the end of 2019,\u201d chief executive officer Patricio de Solminihac said in the statement.<\/p>\n

The firm actually believes it will soon overtake US-based competitor Albemarle as the world’s top lithium miner, by 2022 to be exact. SQM expects to boost its production capacity that year to 28% of the world’s total versus Albemarle’s 16%.<\/p>\n

\n

By 2035, Chile could have an industry of about $10 billion, made up of a combination of carbonate and lithium hydroxide output as well as value-added products, such as cathodes, according to the Chilean Copper Commission (Cochilco).<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

SQM boss also reaffirmed the firm’s commitment to the 40,000 tonnes per year Mt Holland project in Australia, which he called \u201ca key asset\u201d in the producer’s portfolio.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a very large rock deposit with significant exploration upside. We have secured a key industrial site for the future refinery where we expect to produce at least 45k MT of lithium hydroxide per year,\u201d Solminihac said.<\/p>\n

Last week, SQM sold its 50%-share in an Argentinian brine joint venture<\/a>, leaving the company with a single project outside its core Chilean operations.<\/p>\n

Both Chilean authorities and analysts believe lithium has the potential to become the nation’s second largest mining export, just behind copper. It currently is its fourth biggest<\/a> export.<\/p>\n

The post Chile’s lithium giant SQM sees prices falling further this year<\/a> appeared first on MINING.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n

…read more<\/a> <\/p>\n

From:: Infomine<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Cecilia Jamasmie Chilean lithium miner SQM confirmed Friday it expects realized lithium prices to be lower in the second half of 2018 partly as a result of new supply ramping in Australia and the company’s own predicted increase in sales, even though global demand is forecast to grow more than 20% this year. Delivering […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[360],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/952570"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=952570"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/952570\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=952570"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=952570"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/juniorminingnews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=952570"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}