Market update Graphite - maybe good news for TON ???...

Reference https://investingnews.com/daily/resource-investing/battery-metals-investing/graphite-investing/graphite-market-update/

Key points
Graphite market update: Supply and demand Looking over to what’s ahead for demand, Roskill forecasts that total demand for both natural and synthetic graphite products will be around 1.58 million tonnes in the second half of 2021.

That’s around a 3 percent increase on H1 of this year and a 13 percent rebound compared to H2 2020.“The batteries sector will continue to increase strongly and underpin growth across the graphite industry,” Shaw said. “We are expecting demand growth in excess of 20 percent for the full year across all graphite battery products.”


Miller, demand for natural graphite looks set to improve in H2 given the ongoing recovery of demand from the steel, automotive and construction industries to higher-than-typical levels.“With electric vehicle (EV) sales typically stronger in H2 also, and following robust production and sales figures worldwide in H1 2021, we certainly expect improvements in demand from the battery market later this year,” he said.In terms of supply,

Chinese production is expected to ramp up to meet rising domestic battery demand, as there is still a lot of overcapacity in China.“However, the overall trend is that China is showing less appetite on the raw material side and investing in higher-value downstream industries rather than exploration/mining across most mineral sectors,” Shaw said. “It will continue to increase its own imports of flake graphite.”


Demand from China has been improving in line with the growth of the expandable graphite market, which may lead to tightness if imports from Madagascar are not scaled appropriately,” Miller added.

Elsewhere, mines are reopening as markets recover from COVID-19. Graphite miner Syrah Resources (ASX:SYR,OTC Pink:SYAAF) reopened at 15,000 tonnes per month in March and has kept its output more flexible than before. Meanwhile, Chinese imports from Mozambique remained low through to May.


Madagascan production is ramping up and flowing into China. Tirupati Graphite (LSE:TGR) is expected to bring more capacity online soon in Madagascar,” Shaw pointed out. “Other ex-China projects are in the final stages of development and could potentially enter the market in 2021/2022.”

Read this """""On the supply side, China as always is the region to watch. “For graphite, this means how much it looks to shift towards imports through the remainder of 2021, and what happens in terms of further environmental inspections/closures, which may happen unexpectedly,” she said. “Such closures could speed up China’s desire for foreign supply and, in the short term, drive up prices worldwide.”

"""Hopefully, TON Board and management have a plan in place shortly to start to dig out their Graphite with AF now leading the way with others on board to assist and hopefully turn TON into a monster and a leader, diversification and a positive return going forward for all shareholders and regular communication updates, and not a follower!

Good luck holders...hopefully, TON Team is aware of the demand for Graphite!!!!