LME copper closed at $9,055/mt in overnight trading, a gain of 2.11%. Trading volume was 17,000 lots and open interest stood at 239,000 lots. The most active SHFE 2303 copper contract finished at 69,230 yuan/mt overnight, up 1.42%. Trading volume was 33,000 lots and open interest stood at 136,000 lots.
On the macro front, the dollar rebounded overnight after economic data on Thursday and other reports this week showed that U.S. inflation remains strong and the economy remains relatively resilient in the face of Fed rate hikes. The price of new homes in China rose for the first time in a year in January, which also encouraged the market, and positive expectations continued to increase. In terms of fundamentals, due to the drop in copper prices yesterday, many downstream producers restocked. But due to the implementation of long-term trade orders in 2023, the supply of available cargoes was not very tight.
On the whole, due to poor consumption at present, some sellers lowered their quotes to promote sales. But the downstream buyers continued to restock on demand. In terms of consumption, the end-user market has not seen a significant recovery, and it remains to be seen whether the market demand can continue to increase. It is expected that copper prices will remain rangebound at high levels due to market optimism.
