LONDON: Copper prices crept lower on Friday due to ongoing worries that a global recession and rising Covid-19 cases in China would depress economic growth and demand for metals.

Three-month copper on the London Metal Exchange slipped 0.2% to $8,278 a tonne by 1700 GMT, after touching the highest in more than five months at $8,600 on Monday.

It has declined about 3% so far this week. “China’s Covid problems are still a headwind for industrial metals prices,” said Edward Gardner, commodities economist at Capital Economics. “Although we’ve seen restrictions ease, our China economics team is making the point that the near-term outlook for China’s activity is pretty bleak.”

China, the top consumer of base metals, set out urgent plans to protect rural communities from Covid-19 on Friday as millions of city-dwellers planned holidays for the first time in years.

The most-traded January copper contract on the Shanghai Futures Exchange fell 1.14% to 65,260 yuan ($9,370.24) a tonne.