Lithium “shortage” bubble implodes again

I think the difference is in what a drop is in regards to. A drop of a well established price indicates something has fundamentally changed to make the price go down. A drop from the peak of a large increase that is still far above the previous well established price looks more like something has fundamentally changed to make the price go up, but markets over estimated how much the price would increase. The difference is that the new price, assuming it becomes the new well established price, is lower in one situation and higher in the other. A title implying the former case when it is the latter might fall under the scope of clickbait.

If the price is swinging up and down constantly and there is no well established price, then that is yet another situation which seems different from the previous two and the title might be better off capturing the unsteady nature of the price.

If I make a major story that "X happened three times this year" without pointing out in the title that the historic numbers of X is 2 to 4 each year, it can be treated as a dishonest implication of some trend that doesn't exist. We know many will only read headlines and will not question the implications. This is something worth calling out even when it is over trivial matters to prevent it from being used for more serious matters.

Other expensive materials in the cathode, manufacturing costs, and the anode are most of the major costs. A visualization:

https://elements.visualcapitalist.com/breaking-down-the-cost...

That doesn't exclude sodium batteries as a factor. Quite the opposite imo, since that technology is also highly speculative.

I think it would be highly interesting if physicists/scientists could figure out how to create Lithium in the lab, maybe from Helium -- or some esoteric combination of Helium, Helium isotopes, Hydrogen, Hydrogen isotopes -- and/or energy...

Now that I think about it, maybe it would be possible to make Lithium from a heavier element -- such as Beryllium (the next element in Lithium's period/horizontal row) and/or Sodium (the next element in Lithium's group/family/vertical row -- that is, an element whose properties are the most similar to Lithium).

But, the point is, if scientists or future scientists can do that -- then we can end this Lithium debate once and for all!

Oh sure, it may initially cost, like, trillions of dollars to do this in the lab the first couple of times (the history of using particle accelerators to transmute metals is a case study in cost ineffectiveness -- but then, so is the history of early mainframe computers, and so is the history of using rockets to send satellites to orbit) but eventually with continued experimentation, the cost should become cheaper and cheaper...

First you make it work -- then you make it cheap.

You know, the Elon Musk school of business philosophy...

First you make it work -- then you make it cheap... or at least cheaper...

Which was actually, coincidentally, Henry Ford's philosophy -- and that of the early American capitalists (AKA, "The Robber Barons" -- as well)...

Also, I'd put that simple philosophy against anything that anyone could learn in a Harvard, Stanford or Wharton MBA program (*) for $73,440 and one or two years of their life, plus living expenses!

First you make it work -- then you make it cheap...