Prices for key battery materials such as lithium, cobalt and nickel have fallen sharply this year as electric vehicle sales in China cool off and a surge in supply hits the market.
Since the start of the year, lithium prices have fallen almost 70 per cent and nickel prices have dropped by 40 per cent, while the cobalt market is in a glut with prices hovering slightly above record lows, according to data from Benchmark Mineral Intelligence, Refinitiv and Argus.
Much of the fall is driven by a slowdown in the growth of demand for fully electric cars in China. Sales doubled in the first nine months of 2022 over the same period the previous year, but that rate of growth has slowed to 25 per cent this year.