▪Recently visited:
✓ Tsingshan (largest stainless steel producer in the world) - has strong growth plans, and buying refined nickel on the LME
✓ Jinchuan (largest nickel cathode producer in China)
✓ CATL (One of China’s largest EV pre-curser producer)
With the expected growth in demand from Li ion cell makers, it is good to see that WSA is on the radar of CATL, the largest cell maker with huge multi-year orders from VW, BMW and many other auto makers. I believe Ni sulphide is preferred over other Ni ore as it is generally cheaper to turn into Ni sulphate for batteries.
BHP is now also focused on Ni sulphate production so it could be an interesting bidding war for multi-year off take contracts with WSA, especially as all the players in the Li ion space expect class 1 Ni to be in short supply in the next few tears and need to lock in supply now to cover their multi-year commitments.
