RE: ATM lithium20 Nov 2025 07:57
Big houses are splitting on #lithium. 2026-deficit camp: JPM, Citi, UBS, Rothschild, Arcane, Fastmarkets, China Sec. On the fence: Canaccord & BofA (balance in ’26, deficit ’27–28). 2030 camp: Morgan Stanley, Macquarie, WoodMac, IEA, Goldman still talking late-decade. #BESS #EV
When one of the majors finally flips — especially Goldman — and pulls their deficit call forward from 2030 to 2026, it’ll send a shockwave through the entire lithium complex. We’ve already moved from the grand bottom into the early stages of a grand squeeze: spot is tightening, futures have lit up, LiOH is leading, Li₂CO₃ is chasing, and quiet restocking is underway. The models simply haven’t caught up to the tape.
And that’s the real story — the market isn’t fragile; the old institutional forecasts are. Most big houses are still running 2023–24 assumptions: oversupply, weak demand, high inventories. They’re modelling a world that no longer exists while the physical market is signalling a very different 2025–2026 reality.
When a top-tier macro desk updates, everything shifts at once:
🔥 every other modelling team is pressured to revise
📈 funds rotate from “underweight” to “must-own”
🏭 converters and cathode makers accelerate procurement
🚗 OEMs move from relaxed to urgent
🏛️ strategic buyers realise the timeline has collapsed
This is the part people underestimate: it’s not just a forecast change — it’s a coordination event. Once the street’s consensus jumps forward by four years, sentiment, capital flow and procurement behaviour all snap into alignment with what the fundamentals have been screaming for months.
That’s when you stop seeing a slow grind and start seeing a proper re-rate — because the narrative, the data and the price finally point in the same direction. And right now? We’re only at the opening act of that alignment. The squeeze hasn’t even gone mainstream yet.
Post I saw today