Nickel Prices Fluctuated, and the Nickel Sulphate Produced with MHP Suffered Losses due to the High Raw Material Costs

SHANGHAI, Nov 21 S(MM) - The prices of battery-grade nickel sulphate were 40,700-41,700 yuan/mt as of last Friday, an increase of 300 yuan/mt on the week. SMM battery-grade nickel sulphate price index stood at 40,948 yuan/mt as of last Friday, an increase of 213 yuan/mt on the week. The prices of battery-grade nickel sulphate rose slightly last week. Nickel prices continued to rise sharply, and battery-grade nickel sulphate prices were strongly supported by the cost. Some nickel salt plants that use LME nickel prices as the benchmark suffered losses. If calculated with the current mainstream quoted coefficient in the market, the losses will be even greater. Therefore, nickel salt factories held the prices firm last week. However, the current terminal demand weakened, and the increase in demand brought about by the year-end production rush in the new energy vehicle market gradually subsided. In addition, around the year-end, downstream precursor, cathode active material and battery enterprises focused on the consumption of inventory. Therefore, the demand for battery-grade nickel sulphate weakened. However, as is mentioned above, due to the current tight supply of raw materials, the output of battery-grade nickel sulphate is unlikely to increase significantly. Therefore, under the support of costs, the prices of battery-grade nickel sulphate will not fall significantly in the short term. It is expected that the prices of battery-grade nickel sulphate will fluctuated at 40,500-41,700 yuan/mt. The prices of electroplating-grade nickel sulphate were 48,250 yuan/mt on average as of last Friday, an increase of 2,250 yuan/mt on the week. The electroplating market improved, but the enterprises were still less willing to purchase high-priced refined nickel and electroplating-grade nickel sulphate. The price increase of electroplating-grade nickel sulphate is mainly due to the increase in costs. With the decline in nickel prices, the prices of electroplating-grade nickel sulphate may drop slightly this week.

According to the figure, the battery-grade nickel sulphate produced by MHP suffered losses, while that produced by high-grade nickel matte improved. The production based on nickel briquette still suffered losses. However, after the futures prices of nickel fell last Friday, the profits of battery-grade nickel sulphate produced by MHP improved. It is expected that the prices of battery-grade nickel sulphate will remain stable this week. If the MHP coefficient remains strong, the profits of nickel salt produced by MHP and nickel briquette will still be poor.