It’s a second straight day where a decline is continuing for many of these metal prices. The US Dollar Index is at a one-year high, clearly seems to be making pressure for many of these industrial commodities.
Also, the kind of data that we are reacting to today has been on the weaker side. For example, the Chinese manufacturing PMI numbers for the month of September have come in lower at 49.6. This is lower than the estimate and from the month of August as well, where it was 50.1.
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Then, the Japan industrial output numbers, retail sales numbers, all of that also has come in on the weaker side that is weighing on all over the space.
Copper is trading at a one-week low. Copper prices declined nearly 4 percent for the current month of September itself. On a week basis and for the month of September, both ways we are looking at copper prices in the negative.
Chinese power restrictions clearly seem to be weighing on and then in any case, the housing market in China had been weakening and that has been putting some pressure in case of copper prices.
The Shanghai inventories, while they are at the lowest since June 2009, but it also has to do with China now selling from its reserves for the fourth straight time on October 7, and this time around the copper quantum is going to be around 30,000 tonne.
So overall, until now, nearly 1,40,000 tonne of copper has been sold from the national reserves in China itself in the last couple of months.
Markets also are looking at concerns coming in from the global equity markets where we have seen some pressure that seems to be weighing on across the metal sector.