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Bloomberg) -- South Africa’s currency is on track for its biggest weekly gain of 2023, following Thursday’s larger-than-expected interest rate hike. For Nomura, this is just the beginning of the rally.
The rand leaped 1.6% Thursday to close stronger than 18 per dollar for the first time since Feb. 14. It is up another 0.3% today, pushing its weekly gains to 2.2%, the most since Dec. 23.
The jump followed a half-point rate increase Thursday that was double the amount forecast by analysts, bolstering a currency that is still the third-worst performing among 23 major emerging-market peers tracked by Bloomberg this year. Nomura predicted Thursday that the rally will continue, with the rand averaging 17 to the dollar in the second quarter and 16 in the full year. That compares with median forecasts of 14 analysts for the rand to hit 18 by June and 17 by year end.
Analysts at TD Securities and InTouch Capital say Thursday’s hawkish move by the central bank may help anchor the rand, even though it’s likely to weaken into year-end due to global sentiment and local factors including a weakening outlook for economic growth.
If Nomura seems excessively optimistic to them on the rand, in the past it has sinned by being too pessimistic. Back in January of 2016 when the rand was trading around 16 per dollar, the bank predicted the South African currency would slump to 19 by year end. In fact, it did the opposite, soaring to stronger than 14 to the dollar.
Bloomberg’s probability calculator gives Nomura’s second quarter predictions a 53% chance of coming true. The end of year target has a 40% chance.

https://www-bnnbloomberg-ca.cdn.ampproject.org/v/s/www.bnnbloomberg.ca/south-african-rand-s-biggest-rally-of-year-is-just-the-beginning-nomura-says-1.1903113.amp.html?amp_gsa=1&_js_v=a9&usqp=mq331AQIUAKwASCAAgM%3D#amp_tf=From%20%251%24s&aoh=16802704325497&referrer=hxxps%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com

@LUCAN, YES! Well said, That’s entirely the point. It’s a point that no-one will know until the next operational update. Everything else is just best guess, last year, all the best guesses were wrong. The year before all the best guesses were wrong. Wrong because no-one had a clue what was happening behind the scenes. Same applies now, so best ignore all the predictions, and wait and see.

Yep, undervalued for sure. But the way China is massively building its energy storage projects, I think we can guarantee that the Chinese state will be making very sure they are completely also self sufficient in the vanadium mining, processing and Electrolyte space.

No way, imo, are they’re going to put themselves in a position of all these projects being reliant on foreign imports.

That being the case, China will become totally self-contained and so will probably have little impact on the ROW vandium market prices.

Maybe one day the same will apply to SA?

As we know, BMN reported they had already stopped exporting to the Chinese market. Probably as good a sign as any that the Chinese are already getting enough for their needs from their own resources. .

If folk want to ignore FM when he’s said it’s going to be several years before the E!Z plant will ramp up to its currently installed to capacity - or just pick and choose the bits they want to believe to try justify their narrative, that’s up to them.

jimbo66, who knows, that could happen - but with the huge VRFB installation projects that are continually being reported as being in process in China, I’d of thought it’s more likely that they have more than enough on their plate to cope with at home. As for “There's the new Eskom BESS projects, smallest 77MW up to 8 hours. Spec left open for VRFB”.

Yer, we’ve heard all that before …. many times. And despite all the bolted on, nailed on, can’t fail hype, FM admitted what was blatantly evident all along, he didn’t even attempt to join the party because they knew they didn’t have anywhere near the capacities to service large grid scale projects. Apart from the ELZ plant which is 45% owned by IDC. Nothing much has changed in their abilities to service grid scale projects. Maybe the SA gov might want to pay for a battery manufacturing plant to constructed so BMN can make the most of BMN’s and SA’s natural ‘ in ground’ resources!

@numpty5, maybe, but they have a huge stockpile.
More than enough to raise the cash to put towards the more immediate debt settlement needs and still have copious amounts left over to flog off for anything that might need a VRFB filled up with nectar for the first few years of operation.

No- one in the western world has anything like the capacities to produce battery units at scale in sufficient quantities to compete with lithium, a few mini-grid type contracts per year is where we’re at for a few years imo.

So not much will need to be reserved for electrolyte purposes for a long while yet.

As FM has openly stated, although short term needs can be met if required by doubling up on to shift work, it’s going to take several years before even the currently installed capacity will be needed for major grid scale projects. Battery assembly is the bottle neck. CellCube had a $30 million investment to take manufacturing capacity to a paltry 30MWH. The next step is to go to 150mwh. Who’s gonna fund it. And even then - that’s no- where near enough to compete with lithium for major grid scale projects. African mini- grids is where FM is aiming , quite rightly too imo, and even that’s gonna take some time yet.
But mini- grid projects it will eventually prove to be a huge industry and market on BMN’s doorstep, imo, spread across over 50 countries that make up the African continent.

Let’s hope you right Pal. With expected production improvements for this quarter, there was hope that sales and therefore shipping volumes, either from production or stockpile, would have increased sufficiently enough to have made up for last years well known obstacles. So far that doesn’t seem to be the case despite predicted production improvements to mitigate the load shedding problems and increased Kiln 3 capacity.

Combined with those shipping volumes also showing no signs they are selling off any of the stockpile to make up for any continuing production problems we perhaps don’t yet know about, it all seems to be pointing to a lack of actual sales. Which might explain the current sp levels despite the price of ‘V’ and perceived currency/cost improvements

With this averages, It might be best to temper recent expectations and not to expect anything too wonderful coming out of the next quarterly operational update at the end of next month.

Thanx Pal. As jimbo66 said - phew! The average shipment volumes to the USA are lower than I hoped for -but just hope the rest of the world is making up the numbers.

I certainly hope that’s not correct. Surely those figures means sales are way below bottom end of guidance and together with shipping costs - mean are best - just breaking even, but more likely running considerable losses?

That’s probably just a difference between a last trade price - and quoted mid price.

Strange!
https://www.xe.com/currencyconverter/convert/?Amount=1&From=USD&To=ZAR

@loudspeaker, dunno where you got that from, but doesn’t seem to be right.

1 US Dollar = 18.47 South African Rand. Last updated · 18 March at 09:43 UTC

March 14, 2023
The Netherlands needs 10GW of battery storage by 2030 and, while the market is being held back by onerous grid fees, developers like Lion Storage are working on deploying multi-hundred megawatt systems.

Movement in the country’s battery energy storage system (BESS) market has picked up over the past 12 months. The largest operational system in the country was brought online in October last year by GIGA Buffalo, followed in quick succession by the largest under-construction projects being launched by Rolls-Royce and Alfen in November 2022 and February 2023 respectively.

Lion Storage has early-storage projects in the pipeline with two totalling 350MW/1,400MWh targeting a 2025 commercial operation date (COD) and another two with 400MW/1,600MWh combined capacity for 2026.

In an in-person interview at the Energy Storage Summit in London last month, the firm’s co-founder and CTO Jeroen Althoff talked Energy-Storage.news through the company’s plans, market drivers, regulatory issues, future value stack and other challenges he sees.

Flow batteries seem to be off the menu!………….

https://www.energy-storage.news/netherlands-bess-developer-lion-storage-talks-opportunities-and-challenges/

Green fara, at least use the green bin!

@ chromeinvestor… unfortunately not. Currently none of the European based domestic sized VRFB makers are exporting into the U.K. retail market. There are aren’t any U.K. based factories.

Perhaps of more relevance is- where is all the hardware (batteries) going to come from that they intend to pour this stuff into? You have to take baby steps and walk properly before you can start to run. Also it’s BMN that will be responsible for selling the electrolyte …. to MUST/BE???

And could it be possible that Must/BE will then be responsible for any leasing arrangements from there?

The next step is to discover exactly how this ‘vertically integrated’ set up - is being planned to be structured.

IDC own 45% of the ELZ plant. As it comes into commercial production I’m hoping we might get an indication of how that’s going to affect future electrolyte revenues and any what possibilities of getting that paid off are.

“Mantas …. also noted the importance of the energy transition being just for multiple communities dependent on the coal value chain for their livelihoods. He said that the African continent is well positioned to meaningfully benefit from the just energy transition, as it is endowed with minerals suitable for green energy production.
"Many of the people who are demonstrating think we must not mine because we are tampering with the environment. But those minerals are important to move from high carbon emissions to low carbon emissions," Mantashe said. The mining of minerals like vanadium and lithium - useful for battery storage and platinum - useful for the production of green hydrogen - should be allowed.”

https://www.news24.com/fin24/climate_future/news/just-in-mantashe-speech-disrupted-by-greenpeace-activists-20230307.

6 Mar 2023
President Cyril Ramaphosa on Monday announced Kgosientsho Sputla Ramokgopa as the new minister of electricity who will focus on solving the power crises at Eskom.

“The state of disaster will allow the new electricity minister to exclude certain institutions from load-shedding. This minister will remain in office for as long as it’s necessary to resolve the energy crisis,” Ramaphosa said as he announced a cabinet reshuffle in a live television address.

He said the electricity minister would be expected to coordinate all departments responsible for energy response, and would also be responsible for turnaround plans and overseeing new generation capacity.

“The electricity minister’s primary task will be to reduce the severity and frequency of load-shedding, to oversee the electricity crisis response. He will have political responsibility over all aspects of the energy action plan,” Ramaphosa said, adding that the new minister would “expedite various regulatory processes for energy projects; and enable Eskom to undertake critical maintenance more quickly and efficiently”.

https://mg.co.za/news/2023-03-06-kgosientsho-ramokgopa-gets-green-light-for-minister-of-electricity/

The duty will also be applied to other steel products from the Russian Federation

From April 1, 2023, the USA will introduce a 70% customs tariff on pig iron imports from the Russian Federation. This rate will be extended to other steel and ferroalloy products, as well as scrap. S&P Global reported about it.

In April 2022, the US president signed a law suspending permanent normal trade relations between the United States and the Russian Federation, which made it possible to limit the import of Russian metals and other products.
In June 2022, the United States increased the customs tariff on a wide range of Russian steel products to 35%. Pig iron is not included in this list…………

https://gmk.center/en/news/the-us-is-introducing-a-70-tariff-on-russian-pig-iron/

Alan Patrick Ryan • 3rd+
Mining For Facts, llc;
intherightvein.com

Biden' announcement puts FeV users on notice
ON FEBRUARY 24, 2023
The news that President Biden plans to raise duties on more than 100 Russian metals may be a wake-up call for US vanadium consumers, many of whom reportedly have purchased FeV that was produced from Russian vanadium **** in Europe.

"Some consumers stopped buying Russian-origin months ago," said a trader. "Others are likely to be more vigilant after today's announcement."

One question worth examining is whether US mills that only take 80% FeV can shift to using 50% FeV. Mills that use 80% FeV have options outside of Russia including Brazil and South Africa. But with AMG looking to double its production capacity of 50% FeV this year, it seems plausible that some mills may want to investigate investing in changes that would allow them to rely on domestic supply.

AMG will not be doubling capacity right away given that it just started its new plant in Zanesville, OH, in late October, but the company says it is aiming to be at full capacity in the second quarter.

AMG's production expansion will not help the aerospace sector which needs high purity V205. Largo produces high purity V205 but has had production shortfalls in the last few months.