LONDON: Copper fell sharply on Wednesday from a record high the previous session, while nickel tumbled from a 19-month peak as an early-year rally in industrial metals lost momentum.
Benchmark three-month copper on the London Metal Exchange dropped as much as 3 percent to USD12,842.50 per metric ton and was trading down 2.7percent at USD12,884 at 1505 GMT.
It hit an all-time high of USD13,387.50 on Tuesday on concerns over tight mine supply. “Base metals are softer… as the bullish momentum that has powered the sector since late December pauses for breath,” Neil Welsh, head of metals at Britannia Global Markets, said in a note.
“The market remains heavily driven by positioning and momentum amid lingering supply-chain risks and macro policy uncertainty in the United States.”
Citi on Tuesday raised its first-quarter copper price target to USD14,000 but kept its 2026 average forecast at USD13,000.
“There appears to be a ‘fear-of-missing-out’ action in the market and quite frankly a frenzy towards copper that we view as unsustainable,” Natalie Scott-Gray, senior metals analyst at Stonex, said in a note. Nickel, meanwhile, was down 2.3 percent at USD18,085 a ton. It also plunged as much as 3percent after touching USD18,800 earlier in the session, the highest since June 2024.
Top producer Indonesia’s plans to curb nickel ore output have added a strong supply-risk premium but fundamentals still show a market in surplus, Welsh said. LME nickel stocks climbed to 275,634 tons, the highest since June 2018, after 20,760 tons of inflows, mostly in Kaohsiung, while the discount of the cash LME nickel contract over the three-month forward widened to USD202 a ton, implying no pressing need for near-term metal. One entity currently holds between 30percent and 40percent of LME nickel warrants, exchange data show. Aluminium dropped 1.6percent to USD3,079 a ton, zinc slipped 2.3percent to USD3,178, lead lost 1.5percent to USD2,045 and tin dipped 0.8percent to USD44,110, having earlier hit its highest since March 2022.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2026
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