12:16 PM EST, 12/08/2023 (MT Newswires) -- Deutsche Bank on Friday said it expects most lithium producers to continue to push for higher lithium production on expectations prices for the battery metal will recover amid the push for electrification.

As she published highlights of the bank's eighth-annual Lithium & Battery Supply Chain Conference, analyst Corinne Blanchard said most producers believe price for the metal is near bottoming out and expect a return to normalized range of between US$15 and US$25 per kilogram starting in the second quarter.

"We believe most of the near-term projects will come through due to regionalization becoming increasingly important with supply being (i) incentivized in the US, (ii) pushed in China due to geopolitical tensions, and (iii) protected in Australia. The supply most at risk in our view is South America due to (i) nationalization risk and less stable jurisdictions, (ii) much more juniors/early stage projects with fragile balance sheet and (iii) more challenging access to financing," Blanchard wrote.

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