Interesting Money of Mine interview with a Singaporean based fund manager YJ Lee from Arcane Capital. Interview covers in particular Lithium and silver. 

Why the Lithium Market Has Bottomed with YJ Lee (youtube.com)

If not able to watch, the points I found interesting were:

Lithium

Market is underestimating the extent to which supply is coming off due to low Li prices.

Markert is underestimating the future demand for Lithium. Just as the market wildly over estimated demand 2 years ago. YJ Lee points to as well as EV demand, demand from e-trucks which are using 10 times the lithium of a car and rising stationary battery usage. He thinks the market has missed both. (YJ says already 85% of taxi fleet in China is EVs)

Cheap solar cells have made solar power at certain times very cheap, this in turn makes battery storage more economic.

Poor spodumene grades are coming out of Africa – much in only around 3 to 3.5% Li.  YJ postulates that this has not been fully appreciated in Li production estimates.

Chinese lepidolite mines can be both high and low cost. (Prevailing western mining journalism keeps telling us they are all high cost).

Western tariffs on Chinese cars will be relatively ineffectual. Big markets already in Middle East and Asia + cracks in EU with Norway saying doesn’t want to put tariffs on EVs.  RoW just want cheap cars. Vertical integration of BYD: makes EVs, batteries and has own car export vessels. Is building 7 more that can take 7,000 cars each.

YJ Lee calls now the lithium market bottom.

Silver

New generation of solar cells are more energy conversion efficient, however use more silver.

YJ Lee argues the silver ETF market may get a speculative kick on the back of industrial demand driving up prices and speculators following.

Silver supply is relatively inelastic. Unlike Lithium which is widespread from James Bay in Canada, to Africa to brines in South America to Chinese lepidolites to the deserts of WA. Bloody everywhere.  (It is interesting Mike Henry was asked around 2 years ago why BHP had not got into Li mining. His response was there is not a deposit on the planet large enough to get them interested)

YJ is trying to get off the ground a Green Metals Fund, so he is of course breathlessly pumping up his own tyres. Who really knows what the real situation is. 

Possibly the only truth is there are more people demanding more and less people willing to work to get it.  Get long productive Australia (PLS, WHC, MIN, DVP, GMD).