It's been a brutal year for the Western nickel market but one explorer has offered a different perspective."Its demise has been grossly exaggerated," Stavely Minerals managing director Chris Cairns told the Resources Rising Stars conference in Australia earlier this month.Cairns said there had been a lot of commentary on nickel laterite and "Indonesia killing the nickel market". "This is not true," he said.
"Still interest in nickelBell Potter Securities analyst David Coates told the same conference that investors were still seeking nickel exposure with quality and scale."I think that's where some of the opportunities are – if you're patient, then those will pay off," he said.IGO held its strategy day in Sydney two weeks ago and said nickel, along with lithium and copper, was where the company was focusing.