BLBG: Copper Little Changed on Concerns of Rising Chinese Stockpiles
Copper was little changed after Chinese imports climbed to the highest since at least 2003 amid slumping exports, raising concerns of an oversupply in the world’s biggest user of the metal.
China’s imports of copper and the metal’s products jumped 42 percent in February from the previous month to 329,311 metric tons, according to customs data yesterday. The country’s total exports tumbled a record 26 percent last month from a year earlier, government data showed.
“Metals markets are focusing on the negative implications for Chinese growth from the decline in exports,” David Moore, chief commodity strategist at Commonwealth Bank of Australia, said in an e-mail today. “There is a suspicion that much of the copper imports flowed into stockpiles.”
London Metal Exchange copper for delivery in three months dropped as much as 0.6 percent to $3,568 a ton, and traded at $3,585 at 11:30 a.m. Singapore time. The metal fell as much as 4.4 percent yesterday, the most since Feb. 27.
Copper for June delivery on the Shanghai Futures Exchange lost as much as 1.6 percent to 28,570 yuan ($4,177) a ton, before trading at 28,720 yuan by the midday break.
Inventories in London Metal Exchange warehouses in South Korea, the closest location to China, have fallen for 14 straight days and are half their levels at the start of the year. Shanghai copper stockpiles rose for the first week in three to the highest in more than seven months last week.
Equities Fall
A decline in Asian equities also weighed on metals prices today with the benchmark MSCI Asia Pacific Index dropping for the first time in three days on renewed concern the deepening global recession will cause company earnings to deteriorate further.
“There is still a lot of uncertainty out there over the global economic outlook, and jitters on the equity markets are likely to continue influencing the LME in the near future,” Andrey Kryuchenkov, an analyst at VTB Capital in London, wrote in a note.
Among other LME-traded metals, aluminum rose 0.1 percent to $1,340 a ton, zinc lost 0.6 percent to $1,232 a ton, and lead fell 0.9 percent to $1,260. Nickel and tin hadn’t traded as of 11:37 a.m. in Singapore.
