Jakarta, CNBC Indonesia – The war between Russia and Ukraine has an impact on increasing global nickel prices. The world reference nickel price on the London Metal Exchange (LME) has been observed to have increased by 60% throughout 2022.
Actually, nickel prices have started crawling since early January 2022. However, the Russo-Ukrainian war that raged and reached a point of tension in March 2022 also made the price of this metal soar to the level of US$ 48,084/ton on March 9.
As is well known, Russia is the third largest country in terms of nickel production in the world with production reaching 250,000 tons per year on average.
The war raging in Eastern European countries has sparked fears in the market that global nickel supplies will be getting thinner due to production disruptions in Russia.
Indonesia, as the world’s largest nickel producer, with production estimated to reach 1 million tons in 2021, seems to have received a ‘blessing’ from the geopolitical turmoil that occurred.
The increase in world nickel prices has also become a positive catalyst for stock price movements of issuers with a nickel mining or processing business portfolio.
At least in the past month, the average share price of nickel issuers managed to jump 18.03%. The highest increase in nickel stock prices was recorded by PT Vale Indonesia Tbk (INCO).
INCO’s market capitalization value has shot up 50.87% in the last month and outperformed other stock prices.
In second position, PT Harum Energy Tbk (HRUM) shares rose 26.15% after officially expanding into the nickel business through the purchase of Nickel Mines shares and narrowing the shares of nickel smelter company Infei Metal Industri by 39.2% through its subsidiary PT Tanito Harum. Nickel last year.
The following is the price performance of issuers with nickel business portfolios throughout 2022.
|
Stocks |
1D |
1W |
1M |
3M |
YTD |
|
INCO |
4.52% |
18.84% |
50.87% |
98.06% |
85.36% |
|
TINS |
-1.95% |
8.06% |
21.45% |
59.52% |
38.14% |
|
NICKEL |
-1.60% |
0.00% |
-0.54% |
-3.14% |
-5.13% |
|
DKFT |
-3.11% |
13.04% |
13.87% |
30.00% |
27.87% |
|
HRUM |
-2.31% |
8.27% |
26.15% |
18.53% |
33.17% |
|
NICL |
-1.33% |
0.00% |
-6.33% |
7.25% |
7.25% |
|
ANTM |
-1.72% |
8.37% |
20.76% |
47.29% |
26.67% |
|
Average |
-1.07% |
8.08% |
18.03% |
36.79% |
30.48% |
However, when it comes to production, INCO is the largest producer in the country with a total average production of 75,000 tons per year.
In 2020, INCO’s nickel production reached 72,237 tons. However, in 2021, INCO’s nickel production will decline by 9.5 percent to 65,388 tons.
“We achieved higher annual production than we previously targeted because we delayed the reconditioning of our 4 stoves from November to December this year,” said Febriany Eddy, CEO and President Director of the Companyas quoted by CNBC Indonesia from the company’s official release.
As the largest nickel producer in Indonesia, it is only natural that its share price shot the highest when global nickel commodity prices soared.
In Indonesia, nickel is like ‘new gold’. As a country with the largest nickel reserves in the world and seeing the high economic value of nickel, the government continues to push the downstream nickel industry in the country.
In the medium to long term, the government has a commitment to become a nickel player, especially in supplying raw materials for electric car batteries.
CNBC INDONESIA RESEARCH TEAM
(trp/vap)
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