The Lake Resources N.L. (ASX: LKE) share price is cruising more than 3% higher today with the company's shares now trading at $1.60 apiece.
The clean lithium developer's shares nudged past their all-time high and peaked at $1.66 each in early trade before settling at their current level.
The high follows a sustained period of upward movement, as illustrated by the chart below.
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Another all-time high
The Lake Resources share price has taken off in the past month, up more than 70% during that time.
Its equity curve has shot higher with the company now trading well ahead of many of its sector peers in the S&P/ASX 300 Metals & Mining Index (XMM). [For reference, an equity curve is a graphical representation of how a stock, asset class, portfolio, or investment strategy performs over time.]
This year to date, the sector has climbed around 6% while Lake Resources shareholders have enjoyed a 58% return over the same time frame.
Investors have been piling into the company these past few weeks amid a successful capital raise and updates on its Argentinian lithium operations.
Lithium carbonate prices continue to rise and have stretched to US$78,150/tonne at the time of writing — an all-time high. Meantime, the Bloomberg Lithium Price Index has surged more than 441% year on year.
In a note from January, mining analyst at Red Cloud Securities David A. Talbot also noted Lake offers long-term upside potential.
At that time, he upgraded the broker's outlook and said it forecast feasibility studies to "demonstrate even stronger economics and [was] therefore increasing [the] target price for Lake to A$2.20/share (from A$1.25/share)".
Investors are piling in
Lake's trading volumes have also shot up markedly. Total March volume is already more than 397 million shares – far ahead of the 129 million shares swapping hands in February, according to Bloomberg data.
Most of that has been on the buying side. So far today, 52% of investors are seeking to buy Lake Resources shares, Bloomberg data shows.
Analysts at Bell Potter are also constructive on Lake Resources. The broker is attracted to the company's key lithium asset, the Kachi Lithium Brine project in Argentina.
Bell Potter said there are enormous ESG benefits to the project's lithium extraction technology over alternative incumbent brine and hard rock lithium production methods.
It values the company at $1.82 with a speculative buy, baking in an upside potential of almost 17% at the time of writing.
Meanwhile, analysts at Lodge Partners are equally as bullish on the stock, valuing Lake at $1.77 per share.
The broker had previously valued Lake using a lithium price of US$15,000/tonne. However, it recently said it felt more suitable to increase lithium price input "considering recent activity in the spot price".
In Lodge's model, each US$1,000/tonne movement, up or down, gives a 20% variation to its valuation in the same direction. Thus, a price range of US$16,000/tonne to US$20,000/tonne sees the valuation range from $1.25 to $2.28.
In fact, at the time, Lodge was valuing Lake at a lithium carbonate input price of US$20,000/tonne. That's far below the current price of more than US$78,000/tonne.
The consensus of analyst estimates values Lake at $1.79 per share over the next 12 months, according to Bloomberg data.
Lake Resources share price snapshot
In the last 12 months, the Lake Resources share price has climbed more than 376% and is up a mammoth 58% this year to date.
Just this past month alone, shares have jumped another 70% to set a series of new all-time highs.
