VIDEO - Howard Klein: Rare Earths a Lesson for Lithium Supply Chains

Interview conducted by Priscila Barrera; article text by Scott Tibballs.

Founder of RK Equities Howard Klein believes it is absolutely essential for North America and Europe to develop their lithium resources and nail down a supply chain outside of China to ensure the stable future of the commodity.

“Just think about what China did with rare earths — we cannot have all of lithium chemical production, or a very significant component of that, in China,” he said.

Klein was speaking with the Investing News Network (INN) at the Lithium Supply & Markets Conference in Santiago, Chile, where he also shared his thoughts on the state of the market, navigating the intricacies of investing in lithium and the recently announced London Metal Exchange-Fastmarkets contract.

Klein is unsure of the contract’s ability to provide a lithium reference price, pointing to lithium majors’ reluctance to participate.

“I’ve not been supportive of this movement or thinking that it’s going to be some panacea to decrease volatility or increase funding availability to juniors,” said Klein.

“Without the participation of the major players, I don’t know how much traction it gets.”

When asked about how investors can navigate the industry, he said that there is a lot in the space that generalist investors can get distracted by, but it is worth pushing through.

“At the end of the day, electric vehicles are growing very fast on a global basis, and Albemarle (NYSE:ALB) is a Tesla supplier (NASDAQ:TSLA) via Panasonic (TSE:6752). A very important supplier, so if you like Tesla and you want to play the upstream fuel for Tesla as a US investor, then Albemarle is a good one.”

Watch the whole interview above for more detailed comments from Klein on the lithium industry in 2019. You can also click here to watch our full Lithium Supply & Markets Conference playlist on YouTube.

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Securities Disclosure: I, Scott Tibballs, hold no direct investment interest in any company mentioned in this article.

Editorial Disclosure: The Investing News Network does not guarantee the accuracy or thoroughness of the information reported in the interviews it conducts. The opinions expressed in these interviews do not reflect the opinions of the Investing News Network and do not constitute investment advice. All readers are encouraged to perform their own due diligence.