After a fairly flat week for copper prices, another spike occurred on Thursday, May 27 as a result of a strike by workers at the world’s largest copper mine. That created some uncertainty about short term supplies of copper.
The copper price jumped about 3% on Thursday to $4.51 a pound, which is about the same price tED magazine reported one week ago on May 21.
That is 35 cents a pound below the $4.86 a pound price copper hit back on May 10. An analyst at Saxo Bank called the price drop “shallow” and he expects the price to continue to rise throughout the year. The Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce is placing a $5.25 a pound price tag on copper by the end of this year.
Union members walked off the job at Chile’s Escondida mine after they were unable to agree on a new contract. The union says the timeline to return to work is “indefinite” and they are prepared to stay off the job for a while. Last year, the Escondida mine produced 1.19 million metric tonnes of copper.
For the calendar year, copper prices were at $3.51 a pound on January 1, and stayed somewhat flat throughout the month. The spike in price began in February, when prices reached a high of $4.36 on February 25. After 45 days of fairly flat prices, copper began to spike again in mid-April, before reaching a $4.86 earlier this month.
Tagged with Biggest News, copper