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Picture of a nickel.Peter Spiro

Watch out for a 12 per cent drop in the price of nickel by year-end as the metal heads for its biggest glut in four years, according to a survey of 17 analysts and traders by Bloomberg News.

Scarcity is the watchword for copper and crude oil , but nickel supply is expanding faster than demand. Prices reached a record $51,800 (U.S.) a tonne in 2007 and moved at least 63 percent a year since then, which led nickel buyers to use substitutes instead, Bloomberg says.

Nickel prices have more than doubled over the past two years, largely because of strikes at Vale S.A.'s operations in Sudbury and Voisey's Bay. But the disputes have since been resolved, and Vale expects a 56 per cent gain in production this year, the article points out.

Nickel has fallen 10 per cent this year to $22,370, compared with a 10 per cent advance in the Standard & Poor's GSCI index of 24 commodities.

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