Strengthening Expectations of US-Iran Peace Talks Drive BC Copper Up 0.92% [SMM BC Copper Commentary]

Today, the most-traded BC copper contract 2607 opened at 92,800 yuan/mt. After touching a low of 92,310 yuan/mt at the start of the session, the copper price center fluctuated upward, reaching 93,610 yuan/mt after the daytime session opened, then hovered at highs, and finally closed at 93,200 yuan/mt, up 0.92%. Open interest stood at 10,095 lots, an increase of 364 lots from the previous trading day, while trading volume reached 7,821 lots, an increase of 141 lots from the previous trading day. US April core PCE inflation rose to 3.3%, and US Fed officials remained open to rate hikes. Iran's Revolutionary Guard struck US military bases, escalating military conflict between the two sides. The Iran-US memorandum of understanding has not yet been finalised, with Iran demanding unconditional unfreezing of assets while the US insists on nuclear concessions as a precondition and denied the strait transit fee plan. Expectations of a US-Iran deal gradually deepened, and combined with PCE data meeting market expectations, this boosted copper prices. On the fundamentals, supply side, affected by the widening price spread between futures contracts, suppliers had weak willingness to sell, while spot copper supplies in circulation across China's regions remained tight. Demand side, affected by rising copper prices, downstream players showed insufficient willingness to chase higher prices, maintaining only just-in-time procurement, and overall market trading was sluggish.

SHFE copper 2607 contract closed at 105,000 yuan/mt. Based on the BC copper 2606 contract at 93,200 yuan/mt, its after-tax price was 105,316 yuan/mt. The price spread between SHFE copper 2607 contract and BC copper was -316 yuan/mt, showing an inversion that widened compared to the previous day.