Copper prices have been rising since March 13 following a series of news about “possible production cuts by Chinese smelters.” During this period, geopolitical factors, the US dollar trend, favourable macro front in China, and the COMEX short squeeze event pushed copper prices to a historical high in May. As bullish funds retreated from high levels and downstream operations suffered under high copper prices, leading to negative feedback on consumption, copper prices began to decline gradually from June. In early August, the market briefly traded on recession logic, with LME copper falling to $8,714/mt, then rebounding slightly to $9,200/mt. From June to August, during the continuous decline in copper prices, SMM copper cathode social inventory showed a significant destocking trend, but global visible inventory continued to build up.
Please note that in this article, the visible inventories of the three major global exchanges are…
