Copper Price Heading for Record High, Newmont President Says
By Claudia Carpenter
Feb. 4 (Bloomberg) -- Copper prices are heading for a record
high this year, Newmont Mining Corp. President Pierre Lassonde
said in an interview.
Copper futures in New York have climbed 12 percent this year
to a six-year high, largely on disruptions in production and
increased metals demand in China, the world's biggest copper
consumer. Copper inventories in warehouses monitored by the
London Metal Exchange have dropped 19 percent this year to a 34-
month low.
``The way inventories have been declining, there won't be a
pound of inventory left in warehouses of the world by May,''
Lassonde said. ``I would not be surprised to see a record copper
price this year.''
Copper for March delivery rose 0.6 cent to $1.1745 a pound
on the Comex division of the New York Mercantile Exchange. The
record high of $1.80 was set in 1973, Lassonde said. Newmont, the
world's biggest gold producer, also produces copper at the Batu
Hijau mine in Indonesia and Golden Grove in Australia.
Newmont's fourth-quarter copper production fell 4 percent
from the same period a year earlier, the company said today.
Global copper production has been disrupted as New Orleans-
based Freeport-McMoRan Copper & Gold Inc. had two landslides in
the fourth quarter at its Grasberg mine in Indonesia, the world's
second-biggest copper mine.
Copper demand worldwide exceeded output from refineries and
scrap yards by 360,000 metric tons in the first 10 months of
2003, the International Copper Study Group in Lisbon said in a
Jan. 13 report.
Worldwide copper usage is expected to rise 5.5 percent to
16.36 million tons, led by increases in Europe and Asia, the
Study Group said.
``We think the recovery is much stronger and more broad-
based than the general consensus would be,'' Lassonde said. |
