Copper miners remain bullish on the metal’s future prospects even as a looming 50% US tariff creates short-term price volatility, Barrick Mining Corp CEO Mark Bristow said in Zambia, where the company is expanding its operations.
US President Donald Trump said on Wednesday he would impose the new copper tariff from August 1 to promote domestic development of an industry critical to defence, electronics and automobiles.
The announcement propelled US Comex copper futures to an all-time high.
But analysts predict prices outside the US could be dragged down as countries like Chile, the world’s top copper producer and the United States’ biggest supplier, shift supplies elsewhere in response to the tariffs.
“The copper price is going to be unstable just like everything else in the world, and we will have to get out of this instability,” Bristow told journalists in Zambia’s capital,…


