Peter Hannah

Albemarle , ex-Fastmarkets

[Peter Hannah @PHmetals]

@globallithium Cheers @globallithium! Was great to see you the other week. Very humbled by the kind words, but rest assured Fastmarkets is still in good hands! :)

[Peter Hannah @PHmetals]

Missed opportunity here. Should have called the counter movement Just Stop Just Stop Oil, forcing Just Stop Oil to launch a Just Stop Just Stop Just Stop Oil. Eventually, after Just Stop Just Stop Just Stop Just Stop Oil comes along, maybe they could all agree to Just Stop It…

[Politics UK @PolitlcsUK]

🚨 | BREAKING: Just Stop Oil protestors have been surrounded by “Just Stop Pissing Everyone Off” protestors - preventing them from marching in the road

[Peter Hannah @PHmetals]

@globallithium @MRLMinRes Looks like price may actually have been linked to Q1 average of China spot LiOH price - ours was ~$57/kg minus VAT. If that's the case then next Q could be a lot lower barring a big recovery. Contracts linked to seaborne (Cif CJK) LiOH index would hold up better.

[Peter Hannah @PHmetals]

@anatol414 Manipulation? On whose part? To what end Fastmarkets is a regulated PRA completely independent of market interests. We would have nothing to gain and a lot to lose. Li is an immature, thin-liquidity market - prices can dislocate for many reasons.

[Peter Hannah @PHmetals]

And just as #spodumene spot price ticks up a notch, #lithium carbonate & hydroxide in seaborne spot market cop a pasting!

[Peter Hannah @PHmetals]

@_gobbler @mikee1310 @CMEGroup @FastmarketsNG Not really in this case. The futures contract is cash-settled so the volume doesn't necessarily correspond to physical liquidity - just increased hedging/speculative participation.

[Peter Hannah @PHmetals]

Daily volume hit a new record of 276 lots yesterday on @CMEGroup #lithium hydroxide (#Fastmarkets) futures - open interest now up to 1,362 lots. Increased exposure to underlying index & recent price volatility has seen both hedging & speculative interest tick up.
@FastmarketsNG

[Peter Hannah @PHmetals]

@mikee1310 @CMEGroup @FastmarketsNG Not a lot for price direction. Simply that the market is maturing and more participants are becoming involved in managing their exposure to the index prices their physical contracts settle against. Good for the industry health long-term though.

[Peter Hannah @PHmetals]

@FrankWunderli13 @YingShirleyMeng @nytimes Thanks. Am asking from a complete noob perspective btw as am unfamiliar with the Na-ion raw material supply chain. Just wanting to understand whether there may be any bottlenecks to scaling supply.

[Peter Hannah @PHmetals]

@FrankWunderli13 @YingShirleyMeng @nytimes Are there any feedstock purity requirements that meaningfully limit supply for Na-ion battery application, or can any existing economic source of NaCl be used? How similar or different is it to the lithium story - i.e. technically everywhere but more to it than that? Cheers

[Peter Hannah @PHmetals]

@heppel_george Also, China tends to be quite open about efforts to exert more pricing power on strategic imports, so a cloak and dagger conspiracy would actually be quite out of character!

[Peter Hannah @PHmetals]

I suspect we’ll see this complex market picture remain for some time, but if we view spot spodumene as indicative of expectations for chemicals prices in a few month’s time, I do think the recent higher levels achieved could be an early signal of a shift in trend.

[Peter Hannah @PHmetals]

🧵 Lot of people talking about the pick up in @FastmarketsNG #spodumene spot price yesterday. I do think it’s a significant moment in the broader #lithium price story but requires some interpretation…

[Peter Hannah @PHmetals]

It also implies a spodumene price floor for now that’s much higher than many analysts expected. If merchant-converted spod is still required as the marginal supply source once lepidolite/artisanal starts exiting at <RMB250, then spod should be supported at $4-4.5k/t.

[Peter Hannah @PHmetals]

@heppel_george Think you’re broadly correct here George - bit of a bifurcated market. Map this spodumene price onto spot BG LiOH into Japan/Korea and it makes more sense. Still bullish for spod producers tho imo as suggests merchant-converted spod still required as the marginal supply source.

[Peter Hannah @PHmetals]

@heppel_george Excellent choice of beer 🍻

[CME Group @CMEGroup]

Lithium demand continues to grow, with wide adoption driving open interest beyond 1,000 contracts, extending out to June 2024. Learn more about Lithium futures: https://t.co/bEmsFfGKas