The Zhitong Finance app learned that on November 29, data released by the Shanghai Steel Union showed that battery-grade lithium carbonate fell 2,000 yuan/ton, and the average price was 134,000 yuan/ton, hitting a new low this year. In terms of futures, the main contract for lithium carbonate fell below the 110,000 mark to 10,8850 yuan/ton, down nearly 4% during the day, and continued to hit a new low since listing.

Since lithium carbonate futures were listed in July this year, lithium carbonate futures have shown an almost unilateral downward trend, repeatedly reaching new lows. Among them, the cumulative decline of the main contract for lithium carbonate 2401 reached 55%. Recently, there has also been a situation where the decline has continued to accelerate, and short-term bearish sentiment has reached its peak.

Wei Chaoming, a mid-term futures analyst at Fangzheng, said that the recent decline in the current price of lithium carbonate futures is mainly due to changes in the relationship between supply and demand in the market. On the one hand, demand in the global electric vehicle market has recently slowed, causing demand for battery raw materials to be expected to be cautious;

On the other hand, the spot price of lithium carbonate has been running at a high level in the previous three years, promoting large-scale exploration and development of global lithium ore resources with Africa as a key region. The market expects that the supply of additional lithium salt will be concentrated in the next two years. Under the influence of these two, the spot price of lithium carbonate will continue to exceed the decline.

Looking at the supply side, since November, with the loosening of the agreed pricing mechanism for mine managers, foreign mining lithium salt mills have recovered profits, and lithium salt plants that have cut production in the early stages of maintenance have resumed production one after another. Furthermore, some lithium salt plants have also maintained operating rates by accepting proxy processing orders, and lithium carbonate supply has rebounded month-on-month. In terms of imports, Chile's lithium carbonate exports to China increased 84% month-on-month in October to 17,000 tons. Considering shipping schedules and customs clearance cycles, it is likely that supply will be released in Hong Kong in the near future.

Looking at the demand side, profits from cathode materials have recovered, ternary production has increased slightly, and lithium iron production has continued to decline. According to the data, the production of lithium iron phosphate in November was 114,500 tons, a decrease of 9.8% over the previous month; the ternary cathode production was 5.69 tons, an increase of 1.5% over the previous month. Furthermore, changes in inventory are the most intuitive reflection of supply and demand conditions. Data show that since the end of June, lithium carbonate inventory fluctuations have slowed. At the end of October, stocks were 459.17 million tons, an increase of 154% over the previous year.

In response, Fangzheng's mid-term futures analyst Wei Chaoming said that domestic lithium salt companies' lithium carbonate stocks were at a low level during the year, but they are still higher than in the same period in previous years. Downstream actively removes inventory, so they are not very willing to buy lithium carbonate.

Regarding the future price trend of lithium carbonate, many institutions believe that under the future demand side growth rate and concentrated production on the supply side, it is expected that lithium carbonate prices will still be on a downward channel in the medium to long term.

According to an analysis by Hengtai Futures, from an overall perspective, the fundamentals of lithium carbonate have not changed, supply volume expectations are strong, downstream demand has entered a low season, superimposed cost support has weakened, and lithium carbonate continues its downward trend. However, since lithium prices are currently in a low position, there may be a slight rebound in the short term, and the medium to long term still maintain a biased view.

Ping An Futures said that looking ahead to the future market, the current price of lithium carbonate futures continues to decline, the terminal demand market is weak, battery and battery factory inventories are high, and cathode materials manufacturers mostly use sales for production. It is transmitted through layers of the industry chain. Market purchases are rising rather than buying down, and price pressure is heavy, mostly based on consumable raw material inventories and long-term raw materials. Short-term demand is still an important factor affecting price trends, and industry inventories are high, mine-side costs are falling, pessimism dominates, and the path to bottom of lithium carbonate is long.

Ping An Futures believes that in the medium to long term, the global supply and demand of lithium carbonate was nearly 200,000 tons in 2024. Through the decline in lithium carbonate, the removal of production capacity from high-cost lithium mines has become the mainstream view of shortages. This is also the dominant factor in the continued unilateral decline in lithium prices. If we consider that this part of the production capacity output has once again reached a balance between supply and demand, the low price of lithium carbonate futures is likely to fall below 100,000 yuan/ton, or even to 80,000 yuan/ton before entering a new round of industrial upward cycle.

Everbright Futures pointed out that in terms of marginal changes in lithium carbonate fundamentals, supply has declined, yet demand remains weak, and there is a trend of further tightening of inventories downstream. At the same time, market concerns about delivery issues have declined. Overall, it still treats them with a biased approach, and beware of capital and emotional disturbances.

However, judging from the structure of lithium carbonate futures, Yuanyue contracts have gradually stopped falling. Recently, monthly contracts have declined at an accelerated pace, and the price difference between near-month contracts has rapidly settled. On November 29, LC2407, the secondary main contract for lithium carbonate, rose 2.57%, and the price also surpassed the main contract LC2401. The contract term structure for the near future month changed from the original back to contango for the first time. Short-term sentiment was released centrally, and the structure showed signs of bottoming out.

Furthermore, due to the sharp drop in lithium carbonate prices, the performance of upstream listed companies in the lithium industry is not as good as it used to be.

Recently, a number of lithium mining companies such as Ganfeng Lithium, Tianqi Lithium, and Yahua Group disclosed their three-quarter reports. Their results for the first three quarters and third quarters all declined to varying degrees, and Yahua Group even fell into losses in the third quarter.

Among them, Tianqi Lithium achieved net profit of 8.099 billion yuan in the first three quarters, a year-on-year decrease of 49.33%; net profit for the third quarter was 1,646 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 70.89%. Ganfeng Lithium's net profit for the first three quarters was 6.01 billion yuan, down 59.38% year on year; net profit for the third quarter was 160 million yuan, down 97.88% year on year, down 95.4% month on month.

The Huaan Securities Research Report points out that when the lithium price inflection point arrives in the future, it still depends on when downstream battery consumption will improve, especially for electric vehicle batteries. Looking ahead to the future market, the agency judges that lithium prices will basically not have much room to fall. Downstream companies will take the lead in picking up, and performance is likely to increase.

Related concept stocks:

Tianqi Lithium (09696): On October 11, Tianqi Lithium stated on an interactive platform that Australia's Quinana Phase I lithium hydroxide project with an annual output of 24,000 tons is in a critical period of rising production capacity and external verification, and TLK is actively promoting related work. Up to now, the lithium hydroxide samples distributed by the company to SK On have been certified by the company. Other than that, TLK has not received feedback from other potential purchasers on the relevant certification results.

Ganfeng Lithium (01772): On September 28, Ganfeng Lithium announced that the company has received a notice from Mongolian Mining, that the mining license renewal procedure for the Gabus niobium tantalum mine has been completed, and that Mongolian Mining has obtained an updated mining license issued by the Natural Resources Bureau of the Xilingol League of Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region. The updated mining license is valid from November 6, 2023 to November 6, 2035. The mining scale is 600,000 tons/year, and the mining area is 2.34 square kilometers.

China Innovation Airlines (03931): According to data from the China Automobile Power Battery Industry Innovation Alliance, China Innovation Airlines installed 19.1 GWh in January-August this year, an increase of 620.8% over the previous year. China Innovation Airlines ranked third in the number of power batteries installed in China from January to August this year, with a market share of 8.7%. Societe Generale Securities previously pointed out that the market share of the company's battery loading volume has increased, and power and energy storage batteries are expected to continue to be released; as the scale effect becomes apparent, the share of pack shipments increases, and the pressure on raw material costs eases, profitability is expected to increase.