Cobalt Prices Dropped By 4% To reach 48,795 USD per tonne Last Week
Cobalt, one of the main mining products exported by the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), experienced a significant drop in price on the international market during the period from January 16 to 21, 2023.
According to the report of experts from the National Commission of Mercurials, a structure attached to the Ministry of Foreign Trade, the price of cobalt traded at 48,795 USD per tonne last week against 50,959.00 USD per tonne a week earlier.
Clearly, cobalt was expected to lose USD 2,164 of its market value on the international market for the period reported by Congolese government experts.
This downward trend in the price of cobalt on the international market does not help the calculations of the public treasury of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).
For the 2023 budget year, the Government of the Democratic Republic of Congo intends to capture more than 5 billion in revenue from the mining sector out of the total projections of sixteen (16) billion dollars in revenue from the General Budget.
Vehicle electrification is making cobalt a highly prized metal, as evidenced by the CME futures craze, industry experts note.
It should be noted that after almost 30 years of hiatus, cobalt mining has resumed in the United States of America.
The metal, essential for the manufacture of electric car batteries, had not been produced on American soil since 1994. After strong criticism of the extraction of cobalt in Africa (child labor, safety problems, etc.), car manufacturers seek at all costs to avoid metal from this source.
