- Next year's reopening of Glencore’s (OTCPK:GLCNF, OTCPK:GLNCY) Katanga mine in the Democratic Republic of Congo will end the cobalt supply shortage that has boosted prices by 135% this year, Goldman analysts say of the metal, which is an essential part of most lithium-ion car batteries.
- Glencore, the world’s biggest cobalt producer, is due to bring the mine back on line after a $430M overhaul of its processing system, with the potential to add as much 22K metric tons of cobalt to a market with annual output of ~100K tons.
- As is often the case with commodities, China also likely will prove pivotal to cobalt’s short-term and long-term outlook; China’s market currently is dominated by batteries that do not use cobalt, but manufacturers are shifting to lithium-ion batteries that rely on cobalt because they offer greater power capacity.