Copper price falls amid rising exchange inventories
Copper prices fell on Monday amid rising exchange inventories and signs of weakening demand from top consumer China weighed on sentiment.
Three-month copper on the London Metal Exchange fell 0.7% to $8,900 a tonne by 0321 GMT, while the most-traded May copper contract on the Shanghai Futures Exchange advanced 1.1% to 66,290 yuan ($10,131.28) a tonne, tracking gains in London in the previous session.
Copper inventories in LME warehouses MCUSTX-TOTAL have risen 67% so far in March to 123,800 tonnes, their highest since Dec. 16, 2020. Stockpiles of the metal in ShFE warehouses CU-STX-SGH were last at 188,359 tonnes, a high level unseen since September 2020.
Meanwhile, Yangshan copper premium SMM-CUYP-CN dropped to $60 a tonne, its lowest since Dec. 23, 2020, as inventories in bonded warehouses SMM-CUR-BON leaped to 382,000 tonnes, their highest since July 2019, indicating weakening demand for imported metal into China.
FUNDAMENTALS
* Refined nickel inventories in ShFE warehouses SNI-TOTAL-W dropped to their lowest since June 2019 at 9,339 tonnes.
* Japan’s Sumitomo Corp said its Ambatovy nickel project in Madagascar resumed operation on March 23 after being shut since March 2020 due to the coronavirus crisis.
* Annual profits at China’s industrial firms surged during the January-February period, highlighting a rebound in the country’s manufacturing sector and a broad economic recovery.
* LME aluminium fell 1% to $2,275.50 a tonne, zinc was down 0.7% at $2,812 a tonne, while ShFE nickel rose 1.4% to 123,250 yuan a tonne and ShFE tin jumped 2.1% to 175,630 yuan a tonne.
