Chile lithium revenue comes in under half projected amount in 2025, newspaper reports

SANTIAGO, Feb 12 (Reuters) - Chile's lithium revenues came in at less than half the amount projected by the government in 2025 as prices of the white metal sank, causing a budget shortfall, according to a report from newspaper El Mercurio on Thursday.

• Economic growth agency Corfo holds lucrative lithium contracts, managing the state's vast lithium claims in the Salar de Atacama - one of the world's richest sources of the metal essential for electric vehicle batteries. It collects payments from miners like SQM SQMA.SN and Albemarle ALB.N that operate on its leases.

• El Mercurio reported that Corfo presented projections to the budget office of lithium prices at between $13,000 and $15,000 per ton, but a market downturn caused prices to fall to between $8,900 and $10,000 per ton.

• Lithium revenues came in at $349 million last year, well short of the $737 million Corfo was required to hand over to the government. That prompted an asset sale to plug the budget gap, meeting minutes obtained by the newspaper showed.

• Chile is the world's second-largest producer of lithium and the government has bet on developing reserves to boost revenues, including through a recent tie-up between SQM and state-run copper miner Codelco.