Zinc Is Moderately Concentrated, a Genuine Middle Case in This Series

Zinc’s price has moved in a comparatively contained range, roughly $2,600 to $3,500 per tonne across 2021 to 2025, neither the dramatic swings lithium and nickel have shown nor a one-directional trend like magnesium’s or silicon’s falling prices.

Running the index on zinc’s real 2024 shares (China roughly 32%, Peru 12%, Australia 9%, then India, Mexico, the United States, Bolivia, Russia, Kazakhstan, and Sweden each contributing smaller shares) gives an HHI of roughly 1,698, comfortably inside the “moderately concentrated” band, a genuine middle case in this series, neither cobalt’s geological lock-in nor silver’s near-total dispersion covered on their own economics pages.

Why zinc’s price stability makes sense given this number

A moderate concentration score paired with a comparatively stable price is the expected, unremarkable relationship a resilience model should predict by default, the pattern tungsten also showed, covered on tungsten’s economics page, for a high concentration and high volatility. Zinc’s middle-of-the-road numbers on both axes are the least surprising result in this entire series.

Sources: price history and production shares reference this project’s own published production and price data (USGS); HHI is computed directly from that data; the 1,500 and 2,500 HHI thresholds are the US Department of Justice/FTC Horizontal Merger Guidelines convention.