4 ms·

> * lithium market is opaque. No open market and all contract based Interesting, I didn't know this. Do you know why? Are other metals mostly open (like gold)

• rmm 7y ago
  Most markets are open, it’s the more exotic/specialist metals that are closed. With lithium it’s just the way it’s always been. Historically the market for lithium was industrial uses (lubrication etc) and there were only 3-4 big players that produced it (and often as byproduct of other processes). The big 3/4 companies would produce and often even refine it internally so no need to publish prices. The ev boom is obviously changing that, and they missed it somehow, hence the hard rock miners filling in the demand gap these next few years