Nickel Is Why Indonesia's Export Numbers Jumped. Here's What Nickel Prices Do to the Listed Miners
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5 min read
In 2010, Indonesia exported about US$3.1 billion of nickel-based products. In 2024, that number was about US$33.6 billion, according to trade data reported by Petromindo. That is more than ten times higher in 14 years.
Nickel is a big reason Indonesia's export numbers look the way they do. It also explains why a few listed miners can swing sharply when the nickel price moves.
This post explains, in plain words, how the nickel price is set, why Indonesia matters so much, and how a price move reaches a miner's profit.
Nickel is a metal. Most of it goes into stainless steel. A growing share goes into batteries for electric cars.
Indonesia is now the largest nickel miner in the world by a wide margin. The US Geological Survey (USGS) estimated Indonesia produced about 62% of the world's mined nickel in 2024. Some estimates for 2025 put the share higher, at around two thirds.
That is unusual. For most metals, no single country has that much control. When one country supplies nearly two thirds, its policy choices move the global price.
The global benchmark is the price on the London Metal Exchange (LME). The LME is a market where metal contracts trade. Miners and buyers use its price as a reference.
In early October 2026, reports from SMM and Trading Economics put LME nickel at roughly US$17,000 per tonne (retrieved 7 October 2026). Treat that as a rough level, not a quote. Check the LME for the live figure.
Two things matter more than the exact number:
When supply is large and demand is soft, the price struggles to rise. That is why Indonesia's government has tried to manage supply.
Indonesian miners cannot dig as much as they like. Each year, the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources approves a work plan and budget for every mine. It is called the RKAB (Rencana Kerja dan Anggaran Biaya). It sets how many tonnes of ore a mine may produce.
Reports say the 2025 approvals added up to about 379 million tonnes of nickel ore. For 2026, the government set a lower quota. Reports put it between about 250 and 270 million tonnes, and figures differ by outlet.
Why would a government cut its own output? To support the price. Less ore means less nickel, and less nickel can mean a higher price.
The market reacted. In February 2026, reports said Indonesia cut the quota for Weda Bay, one of the world's largest nickel mines, and the nickel price rose.
There is a catch. Smelters in Indonesia need ore. Reports say smelters needed more than the quota allowed, so they imported ore, mostly from the Philippines. A quota cut helps the price only if it really removes supply.
Here is the key idea. A miner's costs do not move much when the nickel price moves. Wages, fuel and power cost about the same. But what the miner earns per tonne moves a lot.
So a small change in price can cause a big change in profit.
Here is an invented example. These numbers are not from any real company.
| Nickel price now | Price up 10% | Price down 10% | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sales | 100 | 110 | 90 |
| Costs (fixed) | 80 | 80 | 80 |
| Profit | 20 | 30 | 10 |
| Change in profit | none | +50% | -50% |
A 10% move in price changed profit by 50%. Finance people call this operating leverage: a fixed cost base magnifies the effect of price on profit.
It cuts both ways. A miner with high costs can see its profit vanish when the price falls. This is why the reports on 2026 quota cuts also warned that high-cost producers struggle at current prices.
Three IDX tickers are named most often in Indonesian market coverage of nickel: ANTM (Aneka Tambang), INCO (Vale Indonesia) and NCKL (Trimegah Bangun Persada).
They are not identical. A company that mines ore earns differently from one that smelts it, and each has its own costs. Mentioning a ticker here is not a view on whether it is cheap or expensive.
Two things to check for any nickel company:
Export data shows the products differ too. Reports say Indonesia's ferronickel exports in the first half of 2026 were worth about US$7.7 billion, down 5.8% in value from a year earlier. Nickel pig iron exports rose over the same period.
You do not need to predict the nickel price. You need to know what drives it and how much of your portfolio depends on it.
Watch three things:
Then see how much of your holdings sit in commodity-linked sectors. The Market page shows how Indonesian sectors and indices are moving today, so you can see whether miners are leading or lagging the rest of the market.