Re: SSD Prices In A Free Fall
Vanina Mazzillo
Austin, Texas, is expected to see the steepest drop in home prices, with a 12.2 percent decline anticipated. St. Louis, Missouri, will see housing prices fall 11.7 percent and Washington's housing prices will fall about 10.2 percent in 2024, according to Realtor.com.
The projected shift in the housing prices is part of a broader trend influenced by several factors, Realtor said in its report, including elevated mortgage rates, changes in buyer behavior and the evolving economic climate. Affordability becomes a more pressing concern, and the impact is expected to be felt across various sectors of the housing market, from existing home sales to new construction, signaling a shift in the dynamics of buying, selling and renting.
As battery prices fall, Goldman Sachs Research estimates the EV market could achieve cost parity, without subsidies, with internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicles around the middle of this decade on a total-cost-of-ownership basis.
According to new data from the Energy Information Administration (EIA), gas demand increased from 8.01 to 8.58 million b/d last week. On the other hand, total domestic gasoline stocks fell by 1.3 million bbl to 225.7 million bbl. Tepid demand, alongside descending oil prices, has pushed pump prices lower. If oil prices continue to decline, drivers can expect further price drops at the pump in the weeks ahead.
Cost reductions in 2019 are thanks to increasing order size, growth in battery electric vehicle sales and the continued penetration of high energy density cathodes. The introduction of new pack designs and falling manufacturing costs will drive prices down in the near term.
The path to achieving $100/kWh by 2024 looks promising, even if there will undoubtedly be hiccups along the way. There is much less certainty on how the industry will reduce prices even further, from $100/kWh down to $61/kWh by 2030. This is not because it is impossible but rather that there are a variety of options and paths that can be taken.
These prices are an average across multiple battery end-uses, including different types of electric vehicles, buses and stationary storage projects. For battery electric vehicle (BEV) packs in particular, prices were $118/kWh on a volume-weighted average basis in 2021. At the cell level, average BEV prices were just $97/kWh. This indicates that on average, cells account for 82% of the total pack price. Over the past two years, the cell-to-pack cost ratio has diverged from the traditional 70:30 split, a result of changes to pack design, such as the introduction of cell-to-pack designs.
On a regional basis, battery pack prices were cheapest in China, at $111/kWh. Packs in the U.S. and Europe cost 40% and 60% higher, respectively. This reflects the relative immaturity of these markets, the diverse range of applications and, for the higher end of the range, low volume and bespoke orders.
Prices continued to fall in 2021 as the adoption of the low-cost cathode chemistry known as lithium iron phosphate (LFP) increased, and as the use of expensive cobalt in nickel-base cathodes continued to slide. On average, LFP cells were almost 30% cheaper than NMC cells in 2021. However, even low-cost chemistries like LFP, which is particularly exposed to lithium carbonate prices, have felt the bite of rising costs throughout the supply chain. Since September, Chinese producers have raised LFP prices by between 10-20%.
The path to achieving $100/kWh is clear, although the timing now looks more uncertain. In 2021, a wave of automakers released battery technology roadmaps outlining how prices can be reduced below $100/kWh. Companies like Renault and Ford have publicly announced targets of $80/kWh by 2030.
Chef and owner Mark Kioko works in the kitchen of his restaurant in Kitengela, on the outskirts of the capital Nairobi, Kenya, Monday, April 17, 2023. Kioko says he has had to increase prices, and in some cases decrease portion size of items like chapatis, due to persistently high prices of food and cooking oil. (AP Photo/Khalil Senosi)
Linnah Mueni, left, buys a bag of maize flour from a small shop in Kitengela, on the outskirts of the capital Nairobi, Kenya, Monday, April 17, 2023. Mueni, a mother of four who herself sells vegetables for a living, says that high food prices have forced her to survive on one meal per day. (AP Photo/Khalil Senosi)
The owner of a small-scale shop selling vegetables stands by her produce in Kitengela, on the outskirts of the capital Nairobi, Kenya, Monday, April 17, 2023. In Kenya, drought added to food shortages and high prices arising from the impact of war in Ukraine, and costs have stayed stubbornly high ever since. (AP Photo/Khalil Senosi)
Workers are seen in a small restaurant in Kitengela, on the outskirts of the capital Nairobi, Kenya, Monday, April 17, 2023. In Kenya, drought added to food shortages and high prices arising from the impact of war in Ukraine, and costs have stayed stubbornly high ever since. (AP Photo/Khalil Senosi)
Freshly baked bread is displayed in Babushka Bakery in Budapest on Tuesday, April 11, 2023. Around the world, food prices are persistently, painfully high. Puzzlingly, too. On global markets, the price of grains, vegetable oil, dairy and other agricultural commodities has fallen steadily for months. (AP Photo/Denes Erdos)
Food prices were already running high when Russia invaded Ukraine in February last year, disrupting trade in grain and fertilizer and sending prices up even more. But on a global scale, that price shock ended long ago.
The United Nations says food prices have fallen for 12 straight months, helped by decent harvests in places like Brazil and Russia and a fragile wartime agreement to allow grain shipments out of the Black Sea.
Yet somehow exorbitant food prices that people have little choice but to pay are still climbing, contributing disproportionately to painfully high inflation from the United States and Europe to the struggling countries of the developing world.
And many of those costs are embedded in so-called core inflation, which excludes volatile food and energy prices and has proven stubbornly hard to wring out of the world economy. Food prices soared 19.5% in the European Union last month from a year earlier and 19.2% in the U.K., the biggest increase in nearly 46 years.
The White House last year complained that just four meatpacking companies control 85% of the U.S. beef market. Likewise, just four firms control 70% of the pork market and 54% of the poultry market. Those companies, critics say, can and do use their market power to raise prices.
Corn flour, a staple in Kenyan households that is used to make corn meal known as ugali, has doubled in price over the last year. After the 2022 elections, President William Ruto ended subsidies meant to cushion consumers from higher prices. Nonetheless, he has promised to bring down corn flour prices.
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