Supply concerns on the Copper market ease – Commerzbank

The Copper price fell slightly at the beginning of the week after the world's largest Copper mine producer announced that operations at one of its mines in Chile affected by an earthquake could largely resume, Commerzbank's Head of FX and Commodity Research Thu Lan Nguyen notes.

Copper mine production in Chile disappoints

"The production outage had briefly fuelled supply concerns in the already tight raw materials market last week and supported the Copper price. However, Chile's mining minister emphasised that the restart would be gradual. Some areas affected by the earthquake would remain closed."

"Nevertheless, production could be resumed at around 80% capacity. In recent years, Copper mine production in Chile, the most important producing country, has repeatedly disappointed, partly due to operational problems."

"Given the IEA's expectation that Copper mine production is likely to fall significantly behind demand in the long term, any news of unexpected production outages is not exactly encouraging."