Copper declined after touching the highest level in two weeks yesterday as investors bet the recent rally was excessive relative to demand prospects in China, the biggest user. Metal for delivery in three months fell as much as 0.5 percent to $8,490 per metric ton on the London Metal Exchange, before trading at $8,517 at 10:41 a.m. Shanghai time. Copper, poised for a second monthly advance, has gained 2.4 percent in February and touched $8,560 yesterday, the highest level since Feb. 13. May-delivery metal on the Comex dropped 0.3 percent to $3.878 a pound. “My bet is that London will eventually be dragged down by Shanghai,� said Jia Zheng, an analyst at Shanghai East Asia Futures Co. “Fabricators in China are not active at all, and London won’t be able to sustain its strength.� Metal for delivery in May on the Shanghai Futures Exchange rose 0.3 percent to 60,600 yuan ($9,621) a ton, or a discount of 2,156 yuan to its LME counterpart, including a 17 percent value- added tax. The metal for immediate-delivery on Shanghai’s Changjiang, the city’s main nonferrous metals market, was quoted at a discount of 400 yuan a ton to the front-month SHFE contract yesterday. Freeport-McMoRan Copper & Gold Inc., the world’s largest publicly traded copper producer, suspended operations in Indonesia after violence flared among employees in the aftermath of a strike, company spokesman Eric Kinneberg said yesterday. Aluminum and nickel in London were little changed at $2,330 and $20,170 a ton, respectively. Zinc fell 0.3 percent to $2,091 a ton, lead declined 0.4 percent to $2,238.75 a ton. Tin rose 1.5 percent to $24,050 per ton. To contact Bloomberg News staff for this story: Helen Sun in Shanghai at hsun30@bloomberg.net To contact the editor responsible for this story: Jarrett Banks in Tokyo at jbanks15@bloomberg.net

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