Industrial metals: electric vehicles are driving a boom in prices

The soaring popularity of electric vehicles is pushing up the price of the industrial metals that make up the batteries.

Workers fill barrels with balls of metal ore
The Democratic Republic of Congo is the leading source of cobalt
(Image credit: © Simon Dawson/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

Electric vehicles (EVs) “are careering towards a giant pothole”, says Jon Yeomans in The Sunday Times. “There isn’t nearly enough metal around to put in all the batteries we need.” Prices are soaring as carmakers engage in a worldwide race to secure supplies of lithium, nickel, cobalt and graphite. “One noted mining investor predicts the coming boom will dwarf the supercycle in commodities unleashed by China’s rapid growth 20 years ago.”

Commodities sit “at the crossroads” of some of today’s key investment themes, says Reshma Kapadia in Barron’s. Digital and green trends will require masses of copper wiring, lithium is needed for batteries and aluminium is required “to build solar panels and wind turbines”. Most commodities spent the 2010s in a bear market, but last year the Bloomberg Commodity index soared 27%, “its best year in decades”.

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Markets editor

Alex is an investment writer who has been contributing to MoneyWeek since 2015. He has been the magazine’s markets editor since 2019. 

Alex has a passion for demystifying the often arcane world of finance for a general readership. While financial media tends to focus compulsively on the latest trend, the best opportunities can lie forgotten elsewhere. 

He is especially interested in European equities – where his fluent French helps him to cover the continent’s largest bourse – and emerging markets, where his experience living in Beijing, and conversational Chinese, prove useful. 

Hailing from Leeds, he studied Philosophy, Politics and Economics at the University of Oxford. He also holds a Master of Public Health from the University of Manchester.