Copper prices struggled to gain ground despite concerns over tight supply on Wednesday as a firmer dollar weighed on prices amid quiet trade ahead of a week-long holiday in top metals consumer China at the start of October.

Benchmark three-month copper HG1! on the London Metal Exchange was down 0.2% at $9,957 a metric ton as of 1019 GMT.

“From a technical perspective, it seems fairly clear it’s hit a significant ceiling for the short term,” said Dan Smith, managing director of Commodity Market Analytics.

One trader said there had been some fresh long positions in copper, but not enough to move the market. “The price is just stuck at the current level.”

The U.S. dollar index DXY strengthened by 0.4%, weighing on the market, even amid lingering supply concerns due to an outage at the Grasberg copper mine in Indonesia.

A stronger U.S. currency makes dollar-priced commodities more expensive for holders of other currencies.

Aluminium ALI1! slipped 0.4% to $2,627 per ton.

But in the United States, the premium paid to buy aluminium (AUPc1) on the physical market – on top of the LME price – was at a record high of $0.74 per lb, or $1,631 a ton.

The premium has almost doubled since the end of May after U.S. President Donald Trump raised the tariff on imports of the metal to 50% from 25%.

CRU senior analyst Alex Christopher said on a webinar this week that the rise in the premium had been slowed by a roughly 150,000 tons inventory build ahead of the increase in tariffs at the start of June.

“We now believe that has been consumed and that’s why we’re now seeing the full impact of the 50% tariff,” Christopher said.

Among other metals, zinc ZNC1! was down 0.1% at $2,884 a ton, even as LME zinc stocks (MZNSTX-TOTAL) fell to 44,400 tons, the lowest since April 2023. Nickel NICKEL1! fell 0.3%, while lead LEAD1! was flat and tin FTIN1! gained 0.3%.
Source: Reuters