On April 26-27 2009, Asian Metal held the first World Cobalt Forum 2009 around the beautiful West Lake in Hangzhou, Zhejiang. More than 220 delegates from around150 companies at home and abroad discussed extensively about the issues which participants concerned such as the situation of supply of raw materials and the demand for downstream products.

In the past more than one year after the economic crisis, China's economy has started to recover step by step driven by the stimulus of the RMB 4 trillion investment. The price of cobalt also has stepped out of the bottom seen in late 2008, while the whole market improves gradually with more manufacturers resuming operation.

Looking into the cobalt market in 2010, under the circumstance of economy recovering worldwide, there is no doubt that LME launching cobalt metal into future market will be a highlight, which will attract more hot money into cobalt market. Therefore, the trend of cobalt market will also be eye-catching.

From the supply side, the production status for some new and old projects outside China is still uncertain. After the slight recover in Africa, whether the export policy of local government for cobalt concentrates and ores will be tightened again? While in the demand side, when the European and the US market can recover firmly? How will the demand for cobalt from new energy industries be next year? In domestic policy side, whether Chinese government will tighten the monetary policy? Whether the import and export policies will be adjusted again? What challenges and opportunities will be brought by the quickly changing US dollar, oil and bulk commodities in 2010?

How to overcome the obstacles during economic development and get out of doldrums, will be a generally issue which participants are concerning about. Therefore, Asian Metal will work with the domestic famous enterprises, to seek a healthy and stable development. We will invite participants home and abroad, aiming to build an interactive participation and win-win platform for the exchange of communication and look into the future cobalt market next year