SQM posts biggest drop in two decades while IPSA heads for its worst session since December 2021

The shares of the Chilean SQM have registered sharp falls in value. In fact, in the last few hours, the non-metallic mining company posted the biggest daily drop in more than two decades. Meanwhile, the Selective Stock Price Index (IPSA) recorded its biggest daily drop since the second presidential round.

The above, after the national chain made by President Gabriel Boric where he announced the National Lithium Strategy. Given that, the Santiago Stock Exchange (BCS), made a query to the firm to explain the reasons behind the fall.

Specifically, the shares of SQM-B lost 17.32%, translating into the largest daily drop since 2001. Meanwhile, the shares of the A series fell 16.86%. In this way, the company has lost around US$3,619 million in market capitalization.

In its response to the BCS, the company maintained that “facts received your letter today, in which you request Sociedad Química y Minera de Chile to report any special circumstance or relevant fact that may explain a drop of 10, 31% in the price of SQM series B shares, experienced today”.

“In this regard, we can inform you that apart from the announcement made yesterday on the national chain about the National Lithium Strategy, we are not aware of any other circumstance that could explain such a variation in the share price,” they added.

IPSA

At about 1:30 p.m. this Friday, the main indicator of the local stock market, IPSA, recorded a 3.56% drop, to 5,205.62 points, dragged down by the SQM-B papers, which were losing 8.86%. The biggest drop since the second presidential round. Meanwhile, at 12:20 p.m., SQM’s series B share fell almost 13% compared to Thursday. Titles A fell 11.83%.

In this sense, Guillermo Araya, from the Renta 4 stockbroker, explained to Third that “the IPSA falls, weighed down mainly by the shares of SQM-B, which fell by around 9%, also considering that SQM-B is a stock with a high weighting within the index.”

“Furthermore, the fall of the non-metallic mining drags down Oro Blanco, which falls by around 4% and is an investment company associated with Grupo SQM,” concluded Araya.