The metal has historically been used as a pigment due to its luminous blue color, and for the ceramic tableware industry, cobalt is mainly used in glazes. According to the magazine of “ceramic information”, cobalt oxide prices soared in recent years is not the first time. Cobalt oxide also staged a rally in 2018. At that time, cobalt oxide peaked at more than 600,000 yuan per ton, so it was called “cobalt grandma” in the industry. After that, the price of cobalt oxide fell all the way, to the first half of 2020, cobalt oxide to more than 140,000 yuan per ton, but by the end of January 2021, cobalt oxide quickly rose to 200,000 yuan. It rose to 450,000 yuan in early 2022.

“Now the price of colored glazes is changing every day, and the impact on the ceramic factory is getting bigger and bigger.” Since the beginning of 2022, the price of ceramic color glaze has been increasing, especially the price of cobalt blue, cobalt black and other colors. This phenomenon has also been confirmed by some color glaze manufacturers. Non-ferrous materials manufacturers informed that cobalt oxide, praseodymium oxide and other color glaze raw materials spot have generally increased by more than 10% since the beginning of the year, most of the color factories have to price their products. Zhu Xiaobin of Qunyi Color said, “In the past, there will be price changes in raw materials around the New Year. In the past, individual prices (raw materials) went up, but this year, most of them went up. Now cobalt oxide has gone up to 451 tons.”

The rapid development of new energy industry has increased the market demand for cobalt oxide

In addition to its use as a pigment, cobalt is currently used primarily as a precursor and cathode in rechargeable batteries — accounting for 56% of total consumption as of 2021.
It is understood that domestic cobalt ore raw materials are mainly imported from Africa, and Gangguo gold is the main producing area of cobalt ore. In recent years, cobalt series products have been widely used in the new energy industry in China, especially in new energy battery manufacturers.
For example, the amount of cobalt oxide used by a new energy battery factory in a month can reach 300-400 tons. With the strong support of the state to the new energy industry, the market demand for cobalt oxide is further increased.
Accordingly, in zibo many ceramic color material company chief looks, compare with new energy industry, the demand that pottery product pair of oxide cobalt may be said “iceberg tip”. At present, the soaring price of cobalt oxide is mainly due to the rapid development of the new energy industry, which has driven the surge in market demand for cobalt oxide.
Experts say cobalt prices will continue to rise over the next three years -Fitch Solutions

Article reference：https://www.miningweekly.com/article/cobalt-price-to-continue-rising-over-next- three-years-fitch-solutions-2022-01-03