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March 13 (Reuters) – Lopper prices rose to their highest in nearly a week on Monday, boosted by a weaker dollar and improved demand from China.
Three-month copper on the London Metal Exchange CMCU3 rose 0.5% to $8,908 a tonne by 0501 GMT, having hit $8,950 a tonne earlier in the session, its highest since March 7.
The dollar sank as U.S. authorities stepped in to cap the fallout from the sudden collapse of Silicon Valley Bank (SVB), which led investors to speculate that the Federal Reserve would now be reluctant to rock the boat by hiking interest rates by a super-sized 50 basis points this month.
A weaker dollar made greenback-priced metals cheaper to holders of other currencies.
In China, signs of improving copper demand have emerged. SHFE copper inventories CU-STX-SGH declined for the second straight week to hit their lowest since Jan. 20 by the end of last week, while the premium for domestic copper SMM-CU-PND climbed to 95 yuan a tonne on Friday, the highest since Jan. 16.
“The market consumption has picked up significantly … and the activity of spot transactions is acceptable, which can also be verified by the gradual increase in daily shipments from Shanghai warehouses,” Huatai Futures analysts said in a report.
“The orders of downstream companies have begun to increase.”
The most-traded April copper contract on the Shanghai Futures Exchange SCFcv1 was almost flat at 69,150 yuan ($10,054.96) a tonne, recovering from a drop to 68,540 yuan a tonne, its lowest since Feb. 28, on risk-off sentiment amid the SVB collapse.
LME aluminium CMAL3 was almost unchanged at $2,312.50 a tonne, zinc CMZN3 was almost flat at $2,936 a tonne, lead CMPB3 was up 0.2% at $2,081 a tonne and tin CMSN3 climbed 1.1% to $23,170 a tonne.
SHFE nickel SNIcv1 shed 3.8% to 176,230 yuan a tonne and aluminium SAFcv1 fell 0.3% to 18,310 yuan a tonne.
SHFE zinc SZNcv1 declined 0.9% to 22,885 yuan a tonne, tin SSNcv1 lost 1% to 187,860 yuan a tonne and lead SPBcv1 was flat at 15,165 yuan a tonne.
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($1 = 6.8772 yuan)
(Reporting by Mai Nguyen in Hanoi; Editing by Subhranshu Sahu and Savio D’Souza)
((mai.nguyen@thomsonreuters.com; Reuters Messaging: mai.nguyen.thomsonreuters.com@reuters.net))
The views and opinions expressed herein are the views and opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of Nasdaq, Inc.
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