Mt Marion lithium concentrate price falls

The owners of the Mt Marion lithium mine in Western Australia have reported a 15pc fall in the mine's contracted spodumene concentrate price for the first quarter of this year.

The price for spodumene with a lithium oxide content of 6pc has fallen to $791.84/dry metric ton (dmt) from $930.80/dmt the previous quarter. The price was $1.070.85/dmt in July-September last year, indicating the extent to which lithium prices have fallen in the past seven months.

Mt Marion is owned by Australian companies Mineral Resources (43.1pc) and Neometals (13.8pc), and Chinese company Ganfeng Lithium (43.1pc), which is also the offtake partner.

It is one of Western Australia's biggest lithium concentrate exporters with shipments totalling 382,000dmt in the year to 30 June 2018, up from 266,000dmt in the previous corresponding period.

Neometals recently agreed to sell its 13.8pc stake in Mt Marion to Ganfeng and Mineral Resources for A$104mn ($76mn). Ganfeng and Mineral Resources will now each own 50pc of the mine, which is expected to produce over 400,000dmt of concentrate in 2019.

Neometals is retaining a life of mine offtake entitlement of 57,000 t/yr of lithium concentrate, which will be channelled to its proposed lithium hydroxide plant at Kalgoorlie. It is also developing a battery recycling plant to extract lithium, cobalt, nickel and other metals from used batteries.