Founder’s Daughter Takes Over in the First Year, Tianqi Lithium Industry Reports a Loss of 7.9 Billion

On March 27th, Tianqi Lithium Corporation held its 2024 performance briefing. The year 2024 marked the first year the company’s founder handed over the reins to his daughter, resulting in a loss of 7.9 billion yuan (RMB). Shareholders raised concerns about the “second-generation succession,” which became a hot topic on Baidu’s search trends on March 28.

According to the “2024 Annual Report” disclosed by Tianqi Lithium on March 27, the company’s operating income in 2024 was 13.063 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 67.75%. The net loss attributable to shareholders of the listed company was 7.905 billion yuan, a 208.32% decrease from the previous year, shifting from profit to loss. This marked Tianqi Lithium’s worst annual performance since going public.

Reports from the “Daily Economic News” on March 27 indicated that Tianqi Lithium had a profit of 7.297 billion yuan in 2023. The company incurred more losses in the first half of the previous year. By the first half of 2024, the company’s losses had already exceeded 5 billion yuan.

During March to April 2024, lithium carbonate prices remained at around 110,000 yuan per ton. Subsequently, due to a decrease in downstream demand and increased inventory accumulation, lithium carbonate prices continued to decline. It wasn’t until the second half of 2024 when overseas mines announced production cuts and domestic lithium mica enterprises ceased production that the spot prices stabilized.

Jiang Anqi, the daughter of Tianqi Lithium’s founder Jiang Weiping, became the company’s chairman in April 2024. The 2024 annual report was the first report released under her leadership at Tianqi Lithium.

Public records show that Jiang Anqi was born in 1987 and holds a Master’s degree in Business Administration from Southwest University of Finance and Economics.

Facing significant corporate losses, Tianqi Lithium held its 2024 performance briefing on the afternoon of March 27. According to reports from “The Paper” on March 27, investors at the briefing directly questioned the “second-generation succession” issue, hoping for current Chairman of the Board Jiang Weiping to evaluate whether he was satisfied with the company’s leadership transition after a year.

During the performance briefing, Jiang Weiping stated that the decision to hand over the reins in 2024 was made after careful consideration. He expressed confidence and trust in Jiang Anqi taking over the leadership, believing that her team’s leadership had a stable and clear vision for the company’s development.

Additionally, during the briefing, Jiang Anqi outlined some of the management’s thoughts and directions. This included consolidating the company’s advantage in raw materials to ensure a stable supply of lithium ore, expanding the basic lithium salt production capacity, and continuously exploring opportunities in the industry chain to provide new value growth points for the company.

As of the market close on March 27, Tianqi Lithium’s stock price was 30.69 yuan per share. Compared to its historic high of 148.57 yuan per share in July 2022, the company’s stock price has dropped by nearly 80%, shrinking its market value from over 200 billion yuan to nearly 50 billion yuan.

By 11:30 on March 28, Tianqi Lithium’s stock was trading at 30.58 yuan per share, a 1.32% decrease, with a total market value of 50.189 billion yuan.