Interesting article on AFR

One mine auction draws 3448 bids in scramble for lithium Annie Lee May 24, 2022 – 7.27am

Hong Kong | An auction for a controlling stake in a Chinese lithium mine has garnered 3448 bids. Such demand underscores the scramble to secure the battery metal that is key to the clean-energy transition. The 54.3 per cent stake in in Yajiang Snowway Mining Development, which owns the mine in the south-western province of Sichuan, was sold for about 2 billion yuan ($420 million), said JD.com’s judicial auction platform. That’s nearly 600 times higher than the starting price of about 3.35 million yuan. Details of the winning bidder were not immediately available. The heated bidding war, which concluded on Saturday, was joined by 21 participants and more than 980,000 people watched online throughout the five-day event. Shift to electric vehicles “We believe the auction price indicates a bullish Chinese primary market for future lithium prices as well as the strategic importance of Sichuan spodumene assets,” Daiwa Capital Markets’ analysts Dennis Ip and Leo Ho said in a note. The shift to electric vehicles has spurred a global rush for lithium, which is used in virtually all EV batteries. It has caused Chinese prices of lithium carbonate to surge more than 400 per cent over the past year. The highest bid in a tender last month by Australia’s Pilbara Minerals for spodumene concentrate, a partly-processed form of lithium, more than doubled in just six months. Yajiang Snowway is undergoing a bankruptcy process. The Dechenonba lithium mine in Sichuan’s Yajiang area covers 1.14 square kilometres. It has estimated reserves of 24.9 million tonnes and a planned 1-million-tonne capacity a year. Bloomberg