In the first half of 2023, the lithium battery industry will usher in a brutal second half of the knockout round.
Under the global economic downturn and the slowdown in terminal demand growth, the lithium battery industry has experienced an adjustment period from 2022 to 2023. Overcapacity and supply and demand game, global layout and protection are reshaping the industry pattern, and it can be determined that the lithium battery industry has entered a new round of reshuffle cycle.
However, there is an "opportunity" in the "crisis" of the development of the lithium battery industry, and the growth rate of the lithium battery industry in the next 2-3 years will see the accelerated adjustment of the form and product structure of the entire industry, and enterprises with core competitiveness will stand out. To this end, the starting point lithium battery has summarized the top ten keywords of the lithium battery industry in 2023, as follows:
Destocking
"Destocking" is a core topic throughout the lithium battery industry in 2023. The core reason is the imbalance between supply and demand, the downstream terminal demand is less than expected, the growth rate of all links in the industrial chain has slowed down, and some links (ternary cathode, lithium cobalt oxide cathode) have even declined year-on-year.
On the demand side, data from the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers shows that from January to October 2023, China's new energy vehicle sales will be 7.28 million units, a year-on-year increase of 378%；The SPIR Research Institute predicts that China's new energy vehicle sales will exceed 9 million units throughout the year, with a year-on-year growth rate of 314%。
The global trend of electrification is still clear, and the sales of new energy vehicles will continue to grow rapidly in 2023, but the year-on-year growth rate will be higher than that of the previous two years. 6% of the Hurricane pattern has slowed down.
On the supply side, as of the end of November 2023, the actual production capacity of 50 power (energy storage) battery companies around the world has reached 2500GWh, of which 788% of the production capacity comes from China.
Data shows that in 2022, the domestic lithium battery inventory will exceed 150GWh, reaching a record high, which will greatly increase the pressure on the industry to destock in 2023. By the third quarter of 2023, the proportion of inventory reduction in the entire battery industry is relatively small, resulting in the average operating rate of the industry remaining at a low level, and layoffs continued in the first half of the year.
Due to the high inventory of battery companies, the procurement of materials in all links has been greatly reduced, and overcapacity and continuous decline in materials continue to plague upstream chain enterprises.
The view of many people in the industry is that the destocking of the industry will continue, and it may not be until the second half of 2024 that there will be a better inventory level.
1. Lithium carbonate***
The trend of lithium carbonate is one of the most concerned topics in the lithium battery industry, which not only implicates the development of the entire lithium battery industry chain, but also affects the discussion and judgment of the development of the sodium battery industry to a certain extent. Looking back on last year and this year's lithium carbonate**, it can be said that it has experienced a "roller coaster" of ups and downs.
In November 2022, it peaked at 600,000 tons, and in 2023, it will take a sharp turn and never return.
Especially in the first quarter, the overall demand of the lithium battery industry chain was weak, the growth rate was less than expected, and the overall was in the destocking stage, the downstream lithium carbonate procurement volume decreased, and the lithium carbonate ** declined, and the lowest time in April ** fell to 170,000 tons.
The new energy vehicle market and energy storage market have rebounded in the month, and the demand for lithium carbonate has increased, with lithium carbonate rebounding to 300,000 tons, and in the third quarter, it began to gradually return. Since December, battery-grade lithium carbonate has fallen to 100,000 tons, a new low in two years, and lithium carbonate has dropped to about 80,000 tons.
From the supply side, with the gradual increase in the penetration rate of new energy vehicles, the energy storage market has begun to explode, and the two trillion-level markets will bring a huge increase in lithium batteries, and the starting point research institute (SPIR) expects that by 2027, the demand for lithium carbonate will exceed 2 million tons, and the lithium carbonate market space is broad.
According to the capacity planning of mainstream lithium carbonate enterprises and the development progress of related projects, most of them are concentrated in the annual release, and it is expected that after 2024, with the gradual release of new production capacity, lithium carbonate production capacity will gradually exceed slightly in the next 3-4 years.
Lithium carbonate may still fluctuate in the future, and the starting point lithium battery expects that lithium carbonate will be 100,000 tons in 2024.
2. Lithium battery materials** have declined across the board
Lithium carbonate will drive an overall decline in lithium battery materials in 2023. Among them, lithium carbonate, lithium iron phosphate, lithium iron phosphate electrolyte, and lithium hexafluorophosphate in October 2023** decreased by more than 50% compared with the beginning of the year.
3. The battery cell ** continues to decline
With the decline of upstream raw materials**, batteries** have also declined. As of the end of the third quarter of 2023, lithium iron phosphate cells** are about 052 yuan Wh, a price reduction of 0$12 wh;Ternary cell** about 057 yuan Wh, a price reduction of 017 Wh.
In the fourth quarter, the minimum** of energy storage cells in November has dropped to about 0$4 wh;In December, the average price of square lithium iron phosphate energy storage cells has come to 044 yuan wh, continued to decline slightly.
4. Market value and net profit both declined
The supply and demand of the lithium battery industry chain are mismatched, lithium products fluctuate, and the performance of listed companies in the industry generally falls short of expectations, and the market value has declined.
In H1 2023, among the 95 listed companies in the lithium battery concept sector, 64 have a year-on-year decrease in net profit, accounting for more than 60%. Among them, the net profit of 16 companies fell by more than 100% year-on-year, and the largest decline exceeded 1000%. In the third quarter, some lithium battery companies improved, but the decline in overall net profit and product gross profit is difficult to repair in the short term.
Involution
In 2023, from the downstream terminal to the battery and material end, they will all face the pressure of "involution". The root of "involution" lies in the fact that the lithium battery industry has entered an era of comprehensive overcapacity.
In 2023, the expansion of the lithium battery industry chain will not stop. According to incomplete statistics from the starting point of lithium battery, in the first half of the year alone, in the field of lithium batteries, more than 75 new projects have landed, of which the total investment of the project has been announced to be about 380 billion yuan.
On the material side, among the four main materials, by 2025, global enterprises planning to cathode materials will be about 12 million tons, and the corresponding demand will be about 3 million tonsThe anode material is planned to exceed 15 million tons, and the corresponding demand is about 3.2 million tonsThe electrolyte is planned to exceed 6 million tons, and the corresponding demand is about 2.8 million tons.
An important form of "involution" is the ** war. From power to energy storage sector, low-price competition, low-price bidding, and price grabbing have become a phenomenon in the industry this year. The unanimous consensus of the industry is that the second half of the knockout round of the lithium battery industry will be opened, and the "internal strength" will be practiced, the cost reduction and efficiency increase will be adhered to, and the antidote to the situation will be broken from the volume production capacity to the volume technology and volume products. Accelerating "going to sea" has also become a good way for industrial chain enterprises to transfer contradictions.
Listed companies withdraw from lithium batteries
In 2022, the new energy lithium battery industry can be described as the most favored sector by capital and the most popular for investment.
According to the incomplete statistics of the starting point lithium batteryIn 2022, more than 30 listed companies publicly stated that they have crossed the lithium battery industry, with an average of 3-5 listed companies officially announcing lithium batteries every month, and the investment heat is not comparable to other industries, with an investment amount of more than 100 billion yuan, involving subdivisions including lithium batteries, cathode and anode materials, electrolytes, separators, lithium resources and batteries. The cross-border investment forces cover food, chemicals, clothing, medical care, real estate, ceramics and other fields.
In just one year, the lithium battery industry has changed dramatically, the situation has taken a sharp turn, and a new round of knockout has arrived. According to statistics, at present, nearly 20 listed companies have announced the failure to enter lithium batteries, or withdraw lithium batteries to return to their main business, or suspend production and bankruptcy.
For example, on the evening of February 14, Haichen Pharmaceutical terminated the fixed increase and originally planned to invest in the electrolyte additive project and the field of new crown drugsIn May, Panasonic Battery (Shenyang) Plant announced a complete shutdown and dissolution for liquidationMingguan New Materials announced in June that it would completely divest its lithium battery cathode materials businessHouneng announced in September that it would stop the production of lithium batteries due to the high cost of lithium battery production and the inability to meet market demandIn September of the same year, Kunshan Juxin Energy Technology Co., Ltd. was transferred to bankruptcy by the court.
Listed companies such as *ST Songdu, *ST Future, and Bikang Retire, their plans to enter lithium carbonate and lithium hexafluorophosphate have also been "difficult to deliver" due to the sharp drop in materials in the past year, and it is difficult to save the already loss-making performance from lithium transformation.
The "Ice and Fire" of IPOs
In 2023, the IPO situation of lithium battery companies will be turbulent.
The starting point of lithium battery is not completely statistical,So far, nearly 90 lithium battery companies have launched a sprint towards IPO, and more than 25 have completed listing, raising a total amount of more than 100 billion yuanThe raised funds are mainly used for the construction of new projects and R&D centers.
In terms of scale, the number of lithium battery companies sprinting for IPO is higher than that in 2022, and most of them are mainly in subdivided fields. The top 10 battery companies such as CATL, BYD, Guoxuan Hi-Tech, EVE Lithium Energy, Xinwangda, and China Innovation Aviation are still the core customers of most newly listed companies.
This year's IPO companies include domestic mainstream lithium battery companies such as Ruipu Lanjun and Honeycomb Energy, as well as small and medium-sized enterprises such as Wuhan Landian and Lingge TechnologyIt includes not only upstream lithium salt enterprises such as Ronghui Lithium and Jiuling Lithium, but also midstream equipment enterprises such as Chengjie Intelligence and Shangshui Intelligence.
Different from the past, the other side of the IPO boom is that with the phased tightening of A-share IPOs this year, the competition in the lithium battery industry has intensified, the investment enthusiasm has declined, and the news of the termination of the listing has been heard endlessly.
According to the incomplete statistics of the starting point of lithium battery, at present, including Nanfengfeng, ZTE New Materials, Boshi Hi-Tech, CN Technology, Huiqiang New Materials and other lithium battery industry chain related enterprises have terminated the IPO process.
At the same time, listed lithium battery companies have also begun to reduce the scale of financing. For example, Rongbai Technology has a fixed increase from 605.8 billion yuan was lowered to 522.8 billion yuan, and the upper limit of the fixed increase raised amount was lowered from 5.5 billion yuan to 2 billion yuan.
In the view of the starting point of lithium battery, under the new round of industrial cycle, the market knockout competition is more cruel, and the window left for lithium battery industry chain enterprises to sprint to IPO is narrowing, and seizing the last tail to go public is related to whether it can survive in the market in the future.
The first year of industrial and commercial energy storage
2023 is regarded as the "first year" of domestic industrial and commercial energy storage, and the market demand is blowing out. Compared with the grid side and power generation side, the industrial and commercial energy storage market is larger. Due to the wide range of application scenarios and the release of favorable policies such as peak and valley electricity prices and electricity spots, industrial and commercial energy storage is highly favored by all parties.
Since the beginning of this year, leading enterprises in large storage have begun to develop industrial and commercial energy storage business, and have launched new products for industrial and commercial enterprises, and many overseas cross-border players in the fields of household storage, photovoltaics, lithium batteries, charging piles and home appliances have actively deployed industrial and commercial energy storage. According to incomplete statistics, there are currently more than 500 industrial and commercial energy storage system integrators in this emerging market to accelerate the layout.
From 2019 to 2022, the scale of China's industrial and commercial energy storage industry increased from 3576MWh to 18343MWh with a CAGR of 7246%。According to the statistics of the starting point research, in the first three quarters of 2023, China's industrial and commercial energy storage capacity will be newly installed by 18GW, which is expected to reach 25GW, which will reach 93gw。
At present, the competition pattern of China's industrial and commercial energy storage industry is diversified, and the industry is developing at a fast pace and the competition is fierce. Among them, the leading enterprises with large market share, strong industry competitiveness and high market position include CATL, BYD, Envision Power, EVE Lithium Energy, Wotai Energy, etc.
At the same time, because the application level has not yet been opened on a large scale, too many players have entered the game, and industrial and commercial energy storage system integrators are also facing the dilemma of "the first year is the red sea", and the entry is out.
Car companies make their own batteries
With the increasingly fierce competition in the new energy vehicle market environment, car companies no longer want to "work long hours", pay more attention to the independent control ability of the automobile industry chain, and begin to integrate backward "battery manufacturing" and layout of battery raw materials, so as to enhance their bargaining power in the industrial chain.
Almost every other month, a car company releases its own battery. At present, new and old car manufacturers in China, including NIO, Changan, GAC, Geely, SAIC, Chery, etc., as well as foreign car companies such as BMW, Volkswagen, Honda, Tesla and other foreign car companies, have made attempts to develop their own batteries.
There are many people's views that in the battery factory war, the industry out of the cleaning period, the lack of technical product strength, the financial strength of the battery companies or will face risks, car companies self-developed batteries, integration of battery factories will become a trend.
However, one of the problems faced by car companies in developing and manufacturing their own batteries is how to maintain a balance between huge investment and revenue. The self-developed battery determines the price and gross profit of the bicycle, and the OEMs want to reduce costs and increase gross profit with the self-developed battery, and the head power battery companies want to compete, this blueprint seems to be a bit far away. "Self-research and self-production + foreign cooperation" will be a more reasonable way in the long run.
The era of ultra-fast charging has begun
With the solution of the battery life problem of new energy vehicles, the energy replenishment efficiency has become a topic of more concern in the market. Chasing fast charging and ultra-fast charging has become one of the trends of the new energy vehicle industry this year.
On the car company's side, 800V high-voltage fast charging quickly covers models above B. In 2023, a number of car companies will launch 800V high-voltage fast charging models, including BYD, Li Auto, Xpeng, NIO, Geely, Zhiji, AVATAR, GAC, Hechuang, Polestar, BAIC, etc.
Not only domestic OEMs, but also international brands are rapidly promoting the research and development of 800V high-voltage fast charging models, such as Porsche, Audi, Hyundai, Lucid, Lotus, Mercedes-Benz, BMW, Volvo, etc. are accelerating the commercialization process of 800V high-voltage fast charging models.
In terms of battery companies, the leading battery companies represented by CATL are leading the industry into the era of supercharging of new energy vehicles.
In June 2023, CATL released CTP 30 ternary Kirin battery, support 4C ultra-fast charging;In August, the 4C lithium iron phosphate Shenxing super (fast) rechargeable battery was released, announcing that it can achieve the energy replenishment speed of "charging for 10 minutes and a range of 400 kilometers".
At present, mainstream battery companies such as CATL, BYD, Guoxuan Hi-Tech, Honeycomb Energy, EVE Lithium Energy, Funeng Technology, Sunwoda, and China Innovation Aviation have launched fast-charging and ultra-fast-charging battery solutions.
The industry generally believes that with the mass production and delivery of supporting batteries of leading enterprises, the ultra-fast charging scheme of 800V high-voltage electrical architecture superimposed on 4C super-rechargeable batteries will be applied in batches in the future, and the electric vehicle industry will quickly move towards the era of 4C ultra-fast charging.
Zero-carbon transition
In the context of global energy transformation and upgrading, "carbon peak" and "carbon neutrality" have become the consensus of all countries, and "zero carbon" and "low carbon" have become the common goals pursued by enterprises in the lithium battery industry chain.
Especially this year, with the official entry into force of the EU's "New Battery Law", Chinese battery manufacturers are facing the biggest challenge for going overseas.
On August 17, 2023, the "EU Battery and Waste Battery Regulation" officially came into effect, regulating the entire life cycle of batteries from design, production, use and **, in addition, it is also required that from February 2025, electric vehicle batteries listed or put into use in EU member states must provide a carbon footprint statement, and from August 2026, carbon footprint performance grade labels must be marked, and in February 2028, the EU will set a maximum emission threshold for electric vehicle batteries.
On November 6, 2023, the United Nations Global Compact officially released the "Implementing the Global Development Initiative and Accelerating the Realization of the Sustainable Development Goals: Carbon Footprint and Low-carbon Circular Development of Power Batteries".
The head battery factory took the lead. In April this year, CATL held a zero-carbon strategy press conference. Jiang Li, secretary of the board of directors of CATL, announced that CATL will achieve carbon neutrality in its core operations by 2025 and carbon neutrality in its value chain by 2035. As a leading power battery company, CATL has expanded the number of its zero-carbon factories to four.
SVOLT plans to peak carbon emissions by 2026 and achieve carbon neutrality by 2040. With this goal in mind, SVOLT launched the construction of its first zero-carbon industrial park in Dazhou, Sichuan Province in June 2022.
EVE has formulated a carbon reduction roadmap to promote products to gradually achieve low-carbon and zero-carbon goals by carrying out product carbon footprint accounting and setting product emission reduction targets.
In April this year, Sunwoda's ** chain low-carbon management project and product carbon footprint project was launched, and cooperated with the world's leading third-party certification bodies SGS and TUV Rheinland to officially launch the ** chain emission reduction plan.
Ruipu Lanjun said that by 2026, more than 200GWh of zero-carbon battery production capacity will be built.
Envision Technology Group released the "2023 Zero Carbon Action Report", which disclosed that the company had achieved its goal of carbon neutrality in its operations in 2022.
Enterprises can calculate carbon footprint through research and development of low-carbon products, improvement of production processes, promotion of energy conservation and consumption reduction, investment in renewable energy, development of first-class technology, self-development of digital tools, and establishment of zero-carbon industrial parks, so as to achieve carbon reduction and low-carbon in the manufacturing process.
Go to sea
2023 is a year for China's lithium battery industry chain to start going to sea in an all-round way.
"Going abroad" has undoubtedly become the hottest topic in the field of new energy vehicles and power batteries in China. The increasingly cruel competitive environment has made "going to sea" a must-have for China's lithium battery industry chain enterprises.
From technology, products, production capacity, advanced chain, market to capital, battery companies led by CATL will continue to accelerate their global layout in 2023, and overseas performance will gradually become the most eye-catching sector this year.
From the perspective of orders, the global demand for energy storage has exploded this year, and domestic battery factories have expanded their territory in the global energy storage market and frequently won overseas energy storage orders.
In terms of production capacity construction, according to the incomplete statistics of lithium battery at the starting point, as of now, there are already in ChinaCATL, Envision Power, Guoxuan Hi-Tech, China Innovation Airlines, Honeycomb Energy, Funeng Technology, EVE Lithium Energy, Xinwangda, Azure Lithium CoreMore than 10 power battery companies plan or have a deep industrial layout overseas, and there are about 25 publicly reported projects with a total investment budget of more than 400 billion yuan.
Among them, at least 10 projects have an investment budget of more than 10 billion yuan, and only 15 projects have disclosed power battery production capacity plans of more than 440GWh.
On the capital side, since the beginning of 2022, Switzerland has become a generally favored destination for lithium battery companies to list overseas.
In July 2022, the first batch of Chinese listed companies to issue GDRs included four lithium battery companies: Guoxuan Hi-Tech, GEM, Shanshan Co., Ltd., and Keda Manufacturing.
Subsequently, upstream and downstream enterprises in the industrial chain such as Sunwoda, Hangke Technology, Huayou Cobalt, Tianneng Power, Shengxin Lithium Energy, Tianci Materials, and Xingyuan Materials rushed to IPO in Switzerland.