The price of copper and other base metals slipped on Wednesday after US President Donald Trump threatened more tariffs on China, disappointing investors keen for a trade deal.
While Trump said in a speech that a phase one trade deal was close, the market focused on his comments about raising tariffs on Chinese goods "very substantially" if a deal fails to be agreed.
"It raised the level of uncertainty again, coming at a time when the market's been in risk-on, happy-days mode for the past month," said Ole Hansen, head of commodity strategy at Saxo Bank in Copenhagen.
"If you look at copper, it's breaking down a bit. We've had this uptrend since the start of October, but we failed to break above $6,000 and the 200-day moving average."
Last week, copper touched $6,011 a tonne, the highest in more than three months, after gaining about 8% since the start of October.
Hansen said traders were focusing on support at $5,800, a key technical level.
Three-month copper on the London Metal Exchange (LME) shed 0.6% to $5,835 a tonne in final open-outcry trading, the lowest since Nov. 1. It was down for a fourth straight session.
Copper inventories in LME-approved warehouses fell to a five-month low at 224,425 tonnes, while stocks in warehouses tracked by the Shanghai Futures Exchange have declined 44% since March to 148,687 tonnes.
Most of Chile's copper miners said they had maintained their operations on Tuesday, albeit with some delays and sporadic unrest, amid calls for a general strike and a fresh day of social protests.
China's aluminium consumption is seen falling for the first time in 30 years this year as domestic demand and exports decline, research house Antaike said.
The LME net speculative short position had reduced to just 1.2% of open interest at Monday's close, down from a recent peak of 31% in early October, Alastair Munro at Marex Spectron said in a note, referring to the broker's position estimates.
British diversified miner Glencore Plc's Canadian unit said on Wednesday it would permanently close down the Brunswick lead smelter in New Brunswick.
LME aluminium eased 0.7% to $1,765 a tonne, nickel fell 1.8% to $15,380 and zinc declined 2% to $2,422.
Lead dropped 1.2% to $2,035, the lowest since Sept. 6, while tin fell 2.1% to $16,000 after touching $15,970, the weakest since Oct. 1.
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