Albemarle guidance fails to impress amid sky-high lithium prices

The world’s largest miner of the metal, which is a key ingredient in batteries powering electric vehicles, raised its 2022 outlook for earnings per share to between $5.65 and $6.65. That’s “surprisingly low,” said Aleksey Yefremov, senior analyst of U.S. chemicals at KeyBanc Capital Markets.

Investors “were hoping it’d be a blowout because the spot lithium prices are so high,” Yefremov said.  

Lithium started 2022 with a fresh price spike due to a series of near-term risks that are threatening shortages just as demand accelerates with rising electric vehicle adoption. The already tight market is being roiled by disruptions from plant maintenance and the Winter Olympics in China, to pandemic-related labor shortfalls in Australia.

Yefremov expected the company’s lithium business to increase Ebitda by 89%, a number he said is conservative. That compares to company guidance of 65% to 85%.  

Shares of Albemarle fell 6.5% at 5:26 p.m. in New York after-market trading after slumping as much as 12% earlier.