Copper posted its first weekly gain in five weeks on Friday as it pushed near $8,000 per tonne on the back of persistent inventory tightness and a move this week by central banks to boost liquidity. Copper rallied nearly 10 percent this week, outperforming safer havens like gold and climbing back near its late-October peaks.
The move followed a central bank decision to inject liquidity into a distressed banking system, which boosted investor confidence and prices of assets such as base metals. "I think that this rally is purely led by short-covering. It doesn't necessarily ease credit significantly for end-users, it doesn't speak volumes about improvement in demand ... it just washed out a bunch of shorts," said Nic Johnson, who helps manage about $30 billion in commodities at Pacific Investment Management Co in Newport Beach, California. In New York, the key March COMEX contract climbed 5.05 cents or 1.4 percent, to settle at $3.5845 per lb, after dealing from $3.5275 to $3.6335.
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