Soaring demand for copper will help drive mergers, BHP CEO says
Demand for copper, a key element in the energy transition, is set to rise by 70% to 100% by 2050, Mike Henry said
Copper rose on Tuesday, snapping four straight days of losses as a rally in oil prices to more than two-year highs boosted commodities more broadly, and on longer-term expectations that demand will grow and supply remain constrained.
Metals prices are being supported by the steep rise in crude oil, Commerzbank said, which helped push copper back above $6,500 a tonne in early trade after it slid to its lowest in more than a month last week.
“We’ve fallen quite a bit, so some sort of correction is (to be expected),” ING analyst Warren Patterson said. “The outlook is bullish… we’ve had a lack of investment, and we just haven’t seen supply growth matching the demand growth we expect going forward.”
* LME COPPER: London Metal Exchange copper was up 0.7 percent at $6,495 a tonne at 0955 GMT. Prices touched their lowest since mid-August on Friday at $6,366 a tonne.
* OIL: Brent oil prices hovered near 26-month highs after rising more than 3 percent on Monday, supported by Turkey’s threat to cut crude exports from Iraq’s Kurdistan region and signs that market rebalancing is accelerating.
* FINANCIAL MARKETS: World stocks and the euro fell for a fourth day, with investors that had piled into both all year taking a step back as the list of global uncertainties began to lengthen again.
* ELECTRIC REVOLUTION: This year looks set to be the “tipping point” for electric cars, global miner BHP’s chief commercial officer said on Tuesday, with the impact for metals producers felt first in copper, where supply will struggle to match increased demand.
* LME ZINC/LEAD: LME zinc was up 1.6 percent at $3,145.50 a tonne, while lead was 1.2 percent higher at $2,500.50 a tonne.
* ZINC STOCKS: Zinc stocks in LME registered warehouses <MZN-STOCKS> fell another 1,600 tonnes on Monday, exchange data showed, and are now down 39 percent this year.
* ZINC WARRANTS: Another 20,350 tonnes of zinc warrants were cancelled, meaning metal had been earmarked for delivery and was no longer available to the wider market.
* SPREADS: The premium of cash zinc to the three-month contract <CMZN0-3> rose to its highest since early 2007 at $69, reflecting tight supplies of immediately available metal.
* CHINA GROWTH: The Asian Development Bank raised its outlook for China’s economic growth this year on the back of strong domestic consumption, an export recovery and solid growth in services.
* OTHER METALS: LME nickel was 0.1 percent higher at $10,590 a tonne, while aluminium was down 0.3 percent at $2,141 a tonne and tin was up 0.2 percent at $20,745.
(Additional reporting by Melanie Burton in Melbourne, editing by Louise Heavens)
