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BHP (NYSE:BHP) said Wednesday it remains committed to boosting its portfolio of copper and nickel projects but will not enter the lithium market, which it believes is well supplied.
“We still don’t see the demand-supply equation of lithium to be as fundamental as copper and nickel,” Sonia Scarselli of BHP Xlpor, the company’s division that invests in junior mining companies, told Reuters at the Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada mining conference in Toronto.
Meanwhile, BHP (BHP) sees global copper and nickel supplies staying below demand, as few new mines for either metal are coming online in the near future.
Some analysts are forecasting lithium prices to tumble by 25% this year, largely due to an expected slowdown in China’s electric vehicle market as government subsidies fade.
BHP’s (BHP) “future looks good but the stock is not yet a buy,” The Methodical Investor writes in an analysis newly published on Seeking Alpha.
