> "Mid-February also saw reports emerge that the world’s biggest lithium-ion battery manufacturer, China’s CATL (Contemporary Amperex Technology Co., Limited),

> "Mid-February also saw reports emerge that the world’s biggest lithium-ion battery manufacturer, China’s CATL (Contemporary Amperex Technology Co., Limited), had begun offering discounts on batteries sold to certain Chinese EV companies, such as Nio Inc. (NIO) and Zeekr, thus reflecting the ongoing downturn in the lithium price. Such discounts are reportedly being offered to enable CATL’s customers to lock in battery purchases—the most expensive component of EVs—at below-market prices if they agree to purchase at least 80 percent of the batteries they require for their EVs from CATL, on the assumption that lithium-carbonate prices will continue falling significantly." In the U.S. I think this would be quite illegal. I realize China is different, but it's still interesting to see this kind of thing out in the open as if it's normal. (The closest situation I can think of is when Intel was sued by AMD by offering discounts on CPUs to manufacturers that didn't use AMD products[1]. Intel settled with AMD for 1.25 billion dollars.) [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_Micro_Devices,_Inc._v._Intel_Corp https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_Micro_Devices,_Inc._v....