Sydney, March 3, 2026, 18:14 (AEDT) — Trading after hours.
PLS Group Limited dropped 6.8% to finish at A$4.80 on Tuesday, breaking a brief upswing and slipping under A$5 again. Even with this pullback, the lithium miner has climbed roughly 153% in the last year, thanks to a rally that kicked off in late 2025.
Investors dialed down positions in riskier assets after U.S. and Israeli attacks on Iran sent oil prices climbing, pressing fresh on inflation fears. “Economic policy uncertainty was already elevated and now with the Iran conflict, the geopolitical risk is expected to rise too,” said Rupal Agarwal, an Asia quant strategist at Bernstein in Singapore. Reuters
On the domestic front, nerves around rates piled on. Reserve Bank of Australia Governor Michele Bullock said a rate hike could come as early as March, speaking at a Sydney business summit. “I’m not making a prediction about March but it will be a live meeting,” Bullock said. Reuters
PLS kicked off the session at A$5.14, climbed to A$5.20 early, then drifted down to A$4.71 at its lowest, Yahoo Finance figures show. Roughly 16.8 million shares traded. The closing price settled at A$4.805 on that platform.
The rout wasn’t limited to just one name. Mineral Resources tumbled roughly 6.1%, IGO shed close to 6.0%, and Liontown plunged around 9.0%, by Intelligent Investor’s tally.
Commodity prices weighed on the market. Chinese benchmark lithium dropped to roughly 161,000 yuan per tonne on March 3, a 6.7% slide from the previous day, according to Trading Economics. Lithium carbonate, essential for battery production, continued to see pressure.
Zimbabwe’s abrupt ban on exports of raw minerals and lithium concentrates late last month rattled the lithium market, with officials blaming smuggling and irregularities. The decision has thrown up new uncertainties around lithium shipments to China.
Australian shares took a sharp hit Tuesday, the ASX 200 falling 1.34% as losses in miners and gold stocks erased their previous day’s advances.
Still, PLS’s trajectory might not be straightforward from here. Should lithium chemical prices continue to fall while oil holds up—leaving rate expectations elevated—higher-beta miners could remain on the back foot, even absent fresh company updates.
PLS has its next quarterly update scheduled for April 16, according to a calendar listing.
