As the lithium market continues to mature, participants are increasingly looking to untangle the speculative forces exacerbating volatility in lithium carbonate and hydroxide prices from true cell demand signals. The chemical and market properties of battery-grade lithium hexafluorophosphate (LiPF6) electrolyte salt make it an ideal leading indicator for the broader lithium market. Between 31 December 2025 and 28 January 2026, lithium carbonate prices rallied 52%, as reported by Benchmark’s Lithium Price Assessment. This rally was foretold by LiPF6 prices which moved up by 108% between 29 October 2025 and 26 November 2025.

Manganese Metal Company (MMC) has commenced commissioning South Africa’s first high purity manganese sulphate monohydrate (HPMSM) facility at its Mbombela refinery in Mpumalanga. This is a significant step for the country which has long been the world's largest supplier of manganese ore. MMC has operated in Mbombela since 1974 as the world's largest non-Chinese producer of selenium-free electrolytic manganese metal (EMM). It sources ore from the Kalahari Manganese Field in the Northern Cape. The company has added HPMSM production through a brownfield expansion to its existing refinery. MMC is wholly-owned by South African companies.

Andy Miller, chief executive of Benchmark Mineral Intelligence, opened Giga US 2026 in Washington, DC by outlining a rapidly evolving energy security landscape in the US, shaped by trade policy, geopolitics, and rising demand from emerging technologies. “Central to all of that and what's really become the bedrock in the question of how we reach true energy security, I believe, is the ability and the efficiency to store that energy,” Miller said. “All roads lead back to batteries.”