Aluminium prices dipped on Tuesday as a spike in COVID-19 cases in China, depressing hopes that the world's top metals user will relax rigorous controls.
Guangzhou, The major hub for global industry, have seen a rise in new coronavirus cases on Tuesday, pushing the city's capacity to escape a shutdown a la Shanghai to the strain.
On Friday, industrial metals like aluminium, copper. And others surged on expectations that China might relax its strict COVID-19 regulations. Which could increase demand for metals.
Ole Hansen, head of commodity strategy at Saxo Bank in Copenhagen. Said that although the factors that drove the surge have somewhat weakened. It does make sense that we're seeing a retracement. "It was a spectacular rally on Friday," he added.
Low stockpiles and worries over supplies have supported copper. Which surged 7.1% on Friday, its highest one-day increase since January 2009. After initially testing lower on Tuesday, LME copper increased 0.3% to $7,935 a tonne.
Lead down 1% to $2,015.50 per tonne and zinc decreased 0.6% to $2,868 per tonne on the LME. Whereas nickel increased 0.3% to $23,455 & tin increased 2.4% to $19,400.