Cal – I’m not certain if this meets the Agoracom LAC forum standards but the misrepresentation of the global lithium demand is the only reason I’m in the mining space (particularly LAC) and I believe it was and continues to be driven by Tesla. Hopefully Pavel is not reading this today and spending time with his family. Black Friday he can shop with his wife and furiously type on his phone. Do they have Black Friday down under?? Just a little humor (dig)from Nevada…

Tesla has a long history with Ganfeng. Tesla was the first OEM to build a team specifically purposed to secure the needed materials for this EV/power storage worldwide transformation. This is a huge deal! Toyota’s CEO most notably and other OEM had the mindset that “we are not in that space (business) and if we have the demand they will supply it”.  Hum- how’s that going??

3 years ago I came to the conclusion the expert’s estimates for the global lithium demand has and once again continues to be grossly understated just as Jon Evan mentioned recently. Even Jon Evan’s doesn’t recognize the power storage side of the lithium demand.  If you look at Tesla's goals alone you will notice the analyst for many years simply can’t understand Tesla let alone Elon Musk, much like Pavel and therefore discount Musk and therefore the lithium demand. Look into Tesla’s power storage ambitions. We cannot build out the world’s electric grid for EVs without power storage in a MASSIVE way. This is why hydroxide will be less of a demand than carbonate and in part why Tesla is moving in this direction. This is why I mention TP and who they get involved with.  Will Tesla get to their 20 million EVs by 2030. NOT likely but Tesla with their suppliers and partners will continue to be the largest consumer of lithium. When Elon so publicly came out with their secured 10,000 acres of Nevada mining claims, just need salt and signed a deal with Piedmont this was an obvious ploy directed to the battery supply chain as a whole but more particularly (I believe) directed at Jon Evan. “they know who we are…” Let’s hope Tesla will sign with LAC but at a much higher price than they initially negotiated. This would help close the loop.

Here’s a link to Tesla’s Megapack. Designed just a few miles from TP and now slated to be produced at scale in Lathrop.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_Megapack