Little more thinking re. scandium pricing--from another...

Little more thinking re. scandium pricing--from another company's website:


Such a specialist has been found in the person of Dr. Andrew Matheson, a world class authority on scandium alloys and scandium markets. As an accomplished specialty alloy metallurgist, he has worked and still works in conjunction with the U.S. Department of Defense. Conducting a very detailed market assessment, incorporating all the aforementioned insights and filtering them through a sophisticated supply/demand analysis, is what has enabled him to come up with his Scandium pricing forecast.

CHART: Scandium Oxide Pricing Outlook, US$/kg, 2017–2028
Source: OnG Commodities LLC, 2017

OnG provides a forecast of market pricing and the context of current scandium pricing with the following statements:

• “Recent (2015/16) USGS estimates put the price of scandium oxide at US$3,500/kg for a 99.9% purity oxide, to US$5,100/kg for 99.99% purity, while mineralprices.com currently quotes US$4,200/kg for a comparable quality material.
• “Price trends are more reliable than the actual quoted numbers. The general increase in scandium oxide pricing reported by the USGS since 2010, and the narrowing of the spread between low purity and high purity scandium oxide pricing, does reflect an increase in consumption (by Bloom Energy of California) as well as a willingness to purify lower grade scandium oxide through secondary reprocessing. OnG goes on to note that Bloom has, to date, been willing to purchase all the scandium available to it, has entertained long term supply agreements with many (if not all) of the existing and emerging scandium suppliers, and has managed to grow at rates exceeding 40% per year despite scandium oxide prices in the range of US$3,500 to 4,000/kg.
• “So, while too much supply would inevitably depress prices in the long run, a substantial increase in supply, especially if it comes from a more diverse set of countries and is underwritten by well capitalized mining operations managed by credible operators, could allow the scandium market to grow while supporting prices at or close to today’s levels, into the later 2020s.”