London 11/08/2011 - Base metals climbed across the board on Thursday morning, recovering after a steep sell-off in the previous session on robust Chinese trade data, while investors began to view prices as oversold. Bargain-hunting boosted prices across the complex and a largely positive inventory report also lent some support. Copper volumes soared - nearly 16,000 lots were traded by 10:30 London time - when investors piled into the red metal at cheaper prices. It came close to challenging $8,900 after falling as low as $8,518 per tonne on earlier. But trading remained choppy, with market participants traders worried about the health of Western economies in general and the banking sector in particular. “Volatility is likely to remain high across the markets as there remains a massive amount of uncertainty as seen by yesterday’s focus on France and some of its banks,” FastMarkets analyst William Adams said. “This evokes memories of the banking and credit crises of 2008 so we would expect the markets to remain on tenterhooks,” he added. “So while we may see some powerful rallies, we feel it is too early to get too comfortable with these as there may well be further and deeper pullbacks in the days and weeks ahead.” The upswing across the complex highlights the increased volatility in global financial sector this month, with price movements linked to the week-long crash in equities and subsequent sporadic bounces. “The market still remains nervous and susceptible to any further weak economic data which could dent global demand and consumption of industrial commodities," LME RDM Sucden Financial warned. Still, Chinese exports hit a record high in July, rising 20.4 percent from a year earlier and beating expectations for a 17.5-percent increase - shipments to Europe and the US proved stronger than forecast. On Wednesday, France became the latest victim of sovereign debt woes as traders worried that the country may be in financial difficulties, with its triple-A credit rating rumoured to be at threat. French banks are among the most exposed to other European countries’ debt - shares in BNP Paribas lost more than 10 percent while those of Société Générale were down almost 20 percent at one point. SocGen was last down 3.49 percent - it had earlier denied rumours that it was close to collapse, said it expects to report solid results and called for an investigation into the source of the damaging speculation into its financial health, according to a Bloomberg report. Copper was trading at $8,856 per tonne recently, up $261 from Wednesday's close. Stocks fell a net 875 tonnes to 463,150 tonnes - the lowest since July 18 - but cancelled warrants are now the lowest since February 2010 at 8,300 tonnes. Aluminium gained $19 to $2,415. Stocks fell 8,225 tonnes to 4,572,575 tonnes but cancelled warrants also declined to 303,600 tonnes. On Wednesday, warehouse stocks rose 185,975 tonnes or 4.2 percent to 4,580,800 tonnes, a record for a single day, due to 195,850 tonnes being warranted in Vlissingen. Lead at $2,331 was $56 higher after stocks fell 675 tonnes to 309,150 tonnes and cancelled warrants rose a hefty 4,375 tonnes to 15,525 tonnes due to big movements in Singapore and Long Beach. Zinc, which closed at $2,100, was last 3.4 percent higher at $2,172, while nickel was up $475 at $21,450. Tin traded at $23,380, up $905, although stocks are at their highest since April last year. Still, cancelled warrants climbed again, rising 19 percent to 1,295 tonnes. Steel billet was indicated at $565/580 per tonne, while stocks rose by 910 tonnes to 21,125 tonnes - the highest since May 13. Cobalt was indicated at $35,000/39,500 and molybdenum at $30,750/36,000.

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