Lithium bust is over but will battery metal boom again?: Andy Home

June 8, 2026 10:36 AM

Lithium bust is over but will battery metal boom again?: Andy Home

The lithium market has sprung back to life after a three-year slump that left the battery metal languishing at rock-bottom prices for much of 2024 and 2025.   The CME lithium hydroxide contract has jumped by 86% since the start of the year and is trading back above $20,000 per metric ton for the first time since late 2023.   Lithium has a history of boom-and-bust pricing ever since it transitioned from being used in industrial lubricants to powering electric vehicles.   This time around...

Global lithium sector eyes Argentina’s salt flats on tech test run

July 10, 2024 5:42 PM

Global lithium sector eyes Argentina’s salt flats on tech test run

In a dusty plain in northern Argentina's mountains, black tubes stretching two stories high fill a massive tank with salty brine sucked from deep below ground. The brine contains lithium, a silvery white metal essential for making electric vehicle batteries and in high demand as the world shifts to green energy. French miner Eramet is attempting to use an innovative technique, known as direct lithium extraction, or DLE, in a race for cleaner, faster and cheaper ways to produce the metal with le...