translated from Spanish: Shares of lithium deflate in bag by doubts about demand

The largest mining lithium in the world recorded falls in stock market already that disappointing sales of Livent Corp. they raised doubts about forecasts of prices for ore more frequently used in the production of batteries for automobiles.
Livent fell by 9.1 percent in the trading day in New York Tuesday after announcing fourth-quarter revenue lower than the expectations of analysts. Albemarle Corp., the largest producer in the world, came to fall 3 per cent. Sociedad Quimica and Minera de Chile SA (SQM), the second largest, lost 2.8 percent.
Much of the production of the three companies focuses on lithium carbonate, produced from brine under the Andean salt flats in Chile and Argentina. However, the demand of the manufacturers of rechargeable batteries is changing towards more refined, Lithium hydroxide. Lithium Carbonate prices decreased in 2018, while prices and demand for Lithium hydroxide rose, said the Executive Officer of Livent, Paul Bass, analysts on a conference call Tuesday.
“Clearly, the market does not share the opinion of the management team on the strength of prices and demand in the long term”, said MacMurray Whale, analyst of industrial technology of Cormark Securities, in a comment following the announcement of results of Livent. “Is not a question of the demand for lithium per se, but a question of the relative importance of this or that compound lithium”.
Livent, based in Philadelphia, announced income of $119.8 million for the three months ended on December 31, less than the average of $123,3 billion estimates of analysts collected by Bloomberg.
Last year, Morgan Stanley downgraded its forecast for the values of Albemarle and SQM by the expectation of a contraction of prices of lithium carbonate to half for 2021. Prices in South America lithium carbonate fell 14 per cent in the second half of last year, but they are still nearly three times higher than that four years ago, according to Benchmark ore Intelligence.

Original source in Spanish