1、 Trend analysis

According to the nickel price monitoring of the Business Agency, the nickel price rose first and then fell this week. As of January 6, the spot nickel quotation was 216683.33 yuan/ton, down 8.24% from the beginning of the week and up 40.86% year on year.

Weekly rise and fall chart of nickel

According to the weekly rise and fall chart of the Business News Agency, the nickel price has risen by 8% and fallen by 4% in the past 12 weeks, and the nickel price has fallen sharply after the recent strength.

Nickel industry chain

On the macro level, the latest interest rate minutes of the Federal Reserve emphasized the determination to fight inflation, and intensified the market’s concern about the expectation of the US long-term recession.

Supply: At present, Qingshan has commissioned a new energy enterprise in Hubei to produce electrodeposited nickel products. The preliminary design capacity is 1500 tons per month, and part of the volume will be released in January. From the perspective of production, after the new production capacity is put into operation, the contribution to the marginal growth of domestic refined nickel production in 2023 may reach 18000 metal tons, and after the process is mature, it is also possible to expand the capacity. Qingshan’s monthly production capacity of 1500 tons of nickel electrowinning project products have been successfully produced. In January, some of the volume will be released, and the nickel price will be under pressure.

Demand: the growth of new energy demand slowed down, and the price of battery grade nickel sulfate continued to fall. The demand for nickel decreased due to the decline of stainless steel production scheduling.

To sum up, in the first quarter, it is expected that the pure nickel fundamentals will remain tight, and the production capacity of Qingshan 1500 tons/month electrowinning nickel project is expected to gradually release, and the short-term output volume may be limited, which is difficult to alleviate the contradiction between the current tight pure nickel and low inventory. At present, downstream demand is weakening, and nickel price is expected to be weak.