SHANGHAI, Mar 16 (SMM) - In February, the number of days of copper cathode inventory held by Chinese copper smelters was 1.95 days, an obvious drop from 2.55 day at the end of January. In February, even with an increase of 6.39% in domestic output, improving downstream consumption led to a decrease in the inventory days. The export window opened in light of higher overseas copper prices, hence domestic smelters increased their exports, which also contributed to the drop in inventory days. According to SMM's understanding, domestic copper smelters exported about 40,000 mt of copper cathode in February. Among them, about 30% were exported to LME Asian warehouses, especially the bonded warehouses in China.