Three-month copper on the London Metal Exchange was off 0.1 percent at $8,355 a tonne by 0328 GMT. It jumped 1.8 percent on Monday, its sharpest rise since Jan. 12, helped by the euro's surge to near three-week highs against the dollar and China's record imports of refined copper in December. Trading activity was thin in Asia with many markets, including top copper user China, still shut for the Lunar New Year holiday. Volume traded on LME Select for the entire base metals complex was just about 300 lots. Hopes that Chinese demand will stay strong and large stock withdrawals in London warehouses, along with expectations global production may continue to be hit by disruptions, have combined to lift copper by 10 percent so far this year. Latest data shows that copper stockpiles monitored by the London Metal Exchange stood at 345,775 tonnes, the lowest since October 2009. The world refined copper market was in deficit by 296,000 tonnes during the first 10 months of 2011, versus a deficit of 439,000 tonnes in the same period in 2010, the International Copper Study Group said. "Copper remains the tightest of the base metals markets from a fundamental perspective. Even on modest forecasts of global demand growth, we expect the market to record a third consecutive annual deficit in 2012," Macquarie said in a report. But with copper prices "already trading at levels sufficient to incentivise the industry to run to the full extent of its capability", Macquarie said subsequent price rises may only be spurred by "any anticipated acceleration of demand growth in China, where physical stocks are thought to remain low". China's imports of refined copper rose 18.3 percent in December from the previous month to a record high 406,937 tonnes. Copper inventories in warehouses overseen by the Shanghai Futures Exchange rose 9.3 percent to 131,645 tonnes last week, the highest since April 2011. Following copper's rally on Monday, Citigroup said it now sees support for the metal at $8,200 with resistance just above $8,400.