Hyperdrive
Battery-Skeptic Funds Wait Out Cobalt Rally Seen as Fleeting
- ‘Severe oversupplies’ seen driving lithium lower, BofA says
- Tiberius’s Eibl cites uncertainty over future technologies
This article is for subscribers only.
Call them battery skeptics. Bets on surging demand for electric vehicles have made cobalt and lithium hot commodities, but some investors say the outlook is leaving them cold.
While prices have more than doubled in the past three years on worries over shortages of the metals used in batteries, Bank of America Merrill Lynch is predicting “severe oversupplies” in the lithium market, and Tesla Inc. boss Elon Musk says the amount of cobalt his company will use to make electric cars is headed toward “almost nothing.” And Subaru Corp. and Mazda Motor Corp. are for now keeping their focus on conventionally powered vehicles.