Nickel futures climbed to about $17,800 per tonne, a one-month high, as rising costs and tightening supply conditions supported prices. Jakarta has sent a series of hawkish signals, most recently by revising Indonesia’s nickel ore benchmark pricing formula. The new framework now factors in additional metals, including iron, cobalt, and chromium, and increases the corrective factor used to determine minimum ore prices. This effectively raises the cost floor for upstream producers, pushing up input costs for smelters and steepening the global nickel cost curve.
At the same time, supply pressures in Indonesia’s HPAL segment have added to the upward momentum. Sulphur prices have jumped above $800 per tonne, leading some processors to scale back output of nickel intermediates used in battery production, tightening short-term supply. Against this backdrop, steady battery-sector demand and resilient industrial consumption have helped absorb supply risks, keeping nickel prices supported at elevated levels.
